


Project Equinox: Earth 120288a

by BeauJakson



Category: Spider-Man - All Media Types
Genre: Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-16
Updated: 2017-09-16
Packaged: 2018-12-30 07:32:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death, Underage
Chapters: 23
Words: 252,690
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12103788
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BeauJakson/pseuds/BeauJakson
Summary: Once upon a time, Project Solstice was a whopping thirty-six chapters long, and a cumbersome load of a story that was nonetheless entertaining and fun for me to write. In an effort to streamline, lest it grind to a halt due to my lack of enthusiasm in writing the near two-dozen characters I'd loaded the story with, I shaved off everything past chapter twelve, intending to rewrite the story. Here for your perusal are those shaved chapters, totaling a year's effort and the approximate length of two novels. Enjoy.





	1. Chapter 1

“So, Eric York, you know Eric York?” Mary Jane looks to me curiously.

“Tall, acne, biggish nose?” I ask.

“Yeah, him,” Mary Jane says. “Grabbed my ass today.”

“Need help hiding the body?” I ask her, poking at the edge of the lens I’m currently attaching an LCD overlay to.

“Aw, that’s sweet, but no,” Mary Jane says with a little laugh. “I just smacked him across the face. He cried.”

“Proud of you,” I say, holding up the lens, checking for any wrinkles or bubbles, but it’s a perfect fit. “When did Gwen say she was getting done with this student council thing? I thought she quit.”

“She did, but she did such an awesome job while she was on it that they just wanted some of her help with the yearbook,” Mary Jane says. “Why, are you so bored with my company already?”

“Oh, perish even the thought,” I say, and she giggles, rolling onto her side and peering at me from my bed as I pull on a set of gloves and reach for my soldering iron.

“What are you working on over there?” she asks, moving to kneel at the edge of my mattress and stare at my hands. I carefully attach a small wire to the overlay, the other end already leading to a small chip that connects to the other lens, which I just finished moments ago.

“Kind of an augmented reality sort of thing, like Tony has in his suits’ masks,” I say. “Like a video game HUD.”

She’s quiet for a moment, and I look over to see her with an amused smirk on her face.

“What?”

“You just…you say that so casually, and you just invented video game goggles or something,” she says, shaking her head. “That’s something right out of Splinter Cell and you’re just like, ‘Oh, these? Pish-posh, I just made them in my basement, whatever.’ You’re all of Tony Stark’s brains but the complete opposite of that narcissistic streak.”

“You say that, but that narcissism gets him chicks,” I say, pointing a finger at her. “I know Carol loves it.”

“Hey, you get chicks, too,” MJ says. “Or, you would, if you weren’t already with Gwen. You’re really smart and quiet and sweet and…um…stop me if I’m getting weird.”

“Zero weirdness,” I say, setting down the soldering iron and holding my hand out. “De-glove me?”

She tugs the glove off my hand and bops me gently on the head with it as I fit the lenses into a set of rubber frames. In order to make them an effective HUD, I had to make the lenses quite a bit bigger than the old eyeholes in our masks, which called for a whole new mask that I’ve sewn up already. Sadly, I couldn’t get the lines of the webbing in the mask to match up with the webbing of the rest of the suit (and my slightly obsessive-compulsive tendencies just wouldn’t abide by such things), so I’ve recently begun working on a whole new suit. It’s slightly more minimalistic, mostly black with a white web design and some darker steel-blue tones on the hands and feet. 

Gwen and I both feel it’s about time for a costume change, if only out of respect for Harry. Retire the old jerseys and start out fresh as a duo.

Or a trio, if MJ has her way.

“Oh!” she says, bouncing eagerly off my bed and hurrying over. “So, I talked to Tony, and guess what he said?”

“That no, you can’t have a suit of armor meant for military combat just so you can come along on our patrols?” I suggest, and she rolls her eyes, moving up behind me and placing her hands on my chair.

“Nuh-uh!” she says excitedly. “He said, and I quote, ‘If my little protégé can design you a decent suit of collapsible armor for your neighborhood watch, I will machine it right here in Oscorp.’ Which, that sounds like a challenge to me.”

Tony Stark referred to me as his protégé?

That does sound like a challenge.

“I will…look into it,” I say, glancing back at her and snickering when I see she’s found my old mask and has pulled it over her head. Curls of her red hair are poking out from the neck, contrasting sharply with the blue of the mask. She hops onto my bed again and shifts into a rather good imitation of my stock “Spider-Man crouch” and holds her hands, waggling her fingers.

“Shoop-shoop, webs!” she says, giggling at the face I make.

“That’s just not at all how the webs work,” I say with a chuckle. She huffs and pulls the mask away, revealing a pouting face as she tosses it at me.

“I’d know better if you would actually let me help you guys,” she says.

“Why so eager to be a hero?” I ask, spinning my chair to face her as I laboriously attempt to stitch the new lenses into the mask.

If only Mrs. Dandy knew how much I would actually be employing the Life Skills she taught me. I should get her a card.

“I just…I worry about you guys,” MJ says, shrugging bashfully and smiling at me. “I mean…I know you can handle yourselves, and I tell myself every time you go running off to save the day that you’ll be fine, but…I dunno, I just…I think I’d feel better if I was helping you in any way I could. I know I could probably never kick as much ass as you, but if I could take on two guys while you’re handling the other seven, I’d be happy.”

I reach out and poke her in the nose, and she giggles. “Boop,” she says, falling back onto her butt on my bed.

“I suppose we can at least design you something,” I say. “I mean…I suppose being best pals with Spider-Man and the Black Widow, you’re gonna get pulled into some kinda trouble. Might be a good idea to give you something to defend yourself with, at the very least.”

“Yay,” she sings, doing a happy little shoulder-wiggle dance as she sits on my bed. “Oh, but question. Um, why is Gwen Black Widow and not, like, Spider-Girl or Spider-Woman? I mean, you two are a thing, so….”

“We weren’t a thing when we started our little group, so it just never occurred to us,” I say, shrugging. “And by the time we did become a thing, the names had already stuck.”

“You should try some kind of rebranding campaign or something,” Mary Jane said with a small laugh. “Oh! If Gwen becomes Spider-Woman, maybe I can be the Black Widow!”

“Maybe,” I say. “You don’t wanna come up with your own superhero identity?”

She shrugs. “Maybe,” she says, poking her fingers together. “There is one idea I kind of had.”

“Oh? Do tell.”

“Okay, but…well, I’d say don’t laugh, but you never laugh,” she admits, smirking at me. “So, there was this idea I had for a female superhero in a kind of steampunk setting. She’s works at a burlesque house in New Orleans, and her name is Lady Marie.”

“Name sounds familiar,” I point out, and she tosses a wadded up piece of paper at me.

“Shut up,” she sasses. “So, Lady Marie likes to use her burlesque house to kind of take in girls that have nowhere else to go. She never makes them perform if they don’t want to, but she’s all about female empowerment, you know? The guys think they’re there to watch these women cater to them, but the women are just trotting out there and having fun, and the guys are throwing their money at them, so who’s the real winner?”

“Girl power,” I say with a sardonic little fist-shake, and she tosses another wad of paper at me, smiling.

“So, sometimes, Lady Marie finds out about some kind of injustice happening in the city,” Mary Jane says. “She doesn’t discriminate, she’ll help anyone. She’s just out to prove that a girl can be a superhero, too. So, she puts on an old costume from her days as a showgirl and becomes…Jackpot.”

“Jackpot?”

“And she has a catchphrase, right?” Mary Jane says, bouncing excitedly. “She beats the hell out of these guys, and when they’re on the ground, she walks up with her cane, because that’s like her signature weapon, and she presses it to their chin, and she’s like, ‘Face it, tiger, you just hit the Jackpot.’ And, she’s all sassy and 1920s and it’s super great.”

“So that’s why you call people tiger?” I ask.

“That’s why I call you tiger,” she corrects me. “You’re the only one who understands my steampunk obsession, so that’s kinda my stupid little way of sharing it with you.”

“That doesn’t sound stupid at all,” I say, earning another warm smile from her. “Well, we can make you sort of a modern cyberpunk spider-themed Jackpot. Or combine them into like…the Jack Widow.”

“Oh my gosh, get out of here,” she groans, grabbing more crumpled papers from various scrapped designs and tossing them at me. “Booooo, get off the stage.”

“Boy, it’s a tough crowd, Charlie,” I say in my best vaudeville impression. “We might have to break out the ol’ twenty-three skidoo if we’re gonna turn this night around yet.”

“Okay, I’ll forgive the pun because that was actually kinda cute,” MJ says, snickering. “You do a pretty decent imper – “

She breaks off as my police scanner gives a squelch, and we both fall silent.

“Dispatch, we have a 10-31 at One Roxxon Plaza, requesting additional units. Suspect is armed with…unconventional but very effective weaponry.”

I’m already crawling into my new costume, Mary Jane politely keeping her back to me as I slide the shirt on over my head and pull my newly-sewn mask over my face.

Good thing I finished it, at least.

“Go get ‘em, Tiger,” Mary Jane says with a smile as I hurry for the stairs.

……

Alright, New York, it’s just you and me.

As I swing along, the bright blue of my HUD flashes across my vision, telling me my web cartridges were full when I set out and are depleting in microscopic increments as I thwip from building to building. A little compass in the corner tells me which direction I’m going, and thanks to Google Maps and the fact that my phone is synced up to the lenses, a blinking blue arrow points me in the direction I need to go.

Oh yeah, Spidey got an upgrade.

“What’s up, Spidey!?”

“Spider-Man! Marry me!”

“Get out of New York, you freak!”

“Spider-Man! Go to prom with me!”

“This city was better off without you!”

Oh, New York and your mixed signals. Never change.

As I near the Roxxon building, the street below starts to empty out, a police barricade having apparently been setup. Sirens wail below me as police cruisers zoom in the same direction, and I hear the steady whump-whump-whump of a chopper or two buzzing nearby.

It’s quite a scene at Roxxon, apparently.

Roxxon itself is an entire campus of buildings sprawled out over several blocks along the Hudson River. From what I’ve read about them and heard on TV, they’re one of the leading suppliers of fuel in the United States, with gas stations nationwide, and they’re constantly researching new methods of harnessing energy. Recently, they made a bid to hire Tony before he joined up with Oscorp, but Tony apparently didn’t want to work with “big oil”. No doubt, all kinds of neat goodies are collected across the plant, and some ambitious baddy would love to take them for use in their evil schemes.

I arrive to see a plume of smoke rising from some warehouse, two armored trucks sitting nearby with men running back and forth between them and the hole that’s been blown in the building. Through the smoke, I can barely see what looks like a guy riding a broomstick, hovering and barking commands at the men.

Harry Potter? No, you were the Chosen One.

Double reference.

I land on a nearby building, crawling along the side. My goggles track and count a half-dozen henchmen and the guy with the broom, with more guys presumably in the building. The first truck is an INKAS Huron APC, 10-speed, 350 horsepower. The second is a riot-control vehicle, 10-speed, 295 horsepower, with the rear compartment apparently gutted to make room for the loot.

I love these goggles.

“Alright, Spidey,” I tell myself. “Flying solo on this one. Time to watch your own back.”

I can probably get the jump on Harry Potter, literally. He’s hovering below me, and if I aim right, I can drop right on top of him. Shifting my weight, I leap. As I fall closer, I get a better look at him. He’s a tall, gangly man, wearing gear that looks right out of Fallout 4 or Mad Max. Slim-fitting pants and jacket, combat boots, and lots of straps and pockets, all in earth tones. Covering all of this is a hooded muddy-orange cloak that billows in the wind. The hood falls back, and for a moment, I’m stunned as I realize that he’s gone for a Sleepy Hollow, Headless Horseman look, his helmet eerily reminiscent of a jack-o’-lantern.

I wonder if that’s his supervillain name.

I’m sticking with Harry Potter.

I collide with him, and he grunts in surprise, flying off his broomstick.

“What the – “

“Surprise!” I say, webbing him up and stringing him up from a pole as I swing into a landing, holding my hands out and wrapping several of his minions together, causing them to trip. “So, I don’t wanna embarrass you, but someone has to say it. You’re either too late or too early for Halloween. Either way, it’s March. Maybe a cheerful leprechaun costume would – “

The henchmen don’t even let my finish my pithy jab at their boss, the ones I didn’t manage to tie up leveling weapons at me and firing. I leap away, spinning, ducking, dodging, and I have enough time to reflect that I probably look really awesome right now before my spider-sense clangs louder than ever. I leap away just as the ground at my feet explodes.

Whump-BOOM!

“Woah, woah, woah, this is getting hectic!” I yell, glancing around for the source of the explosion. Harry Pumpkin-Head is extricating himself from my webs with the help of a henchman, and other than that, I don’t really see anyone.

“That’s what you get for crashing our fucking party!” a small female voice yells at me. “What the shit are you supposed to be, some kind of fairy-ass gymnast ballet bitch?”

“Wow, you cuss so much,” I say with as much sarcasm as I can muster, my eyes finally landing on a girl about my age standing next to a woman that’s either her older sister or her young mother. They’re both slim and petite, with dark brown hair and matching cool blue eyes. Both are wearing what’s probably supposed to be tactical gear like Harry Potter’s up there, but they just couldn’t resist slutting it up with the booty-shorts and halter tops. “You must be so very cool. I am so impressed with your very adult vocabulary.”

“No, I’m ‘so very cool’ because I can do this,” the girl says, and my spider-sense chimes again as she holds her hands out. Leaping away, I feel the concussive force of another explosion, carrying me a little further than I originally intended. I twist in the air, and I’m just trying to figure out how I’m gonna land this when a gap-toothed, grinning pumpkin-head fills my vision, eyes and mouth backlit by a sinister orange light.

“Spider-Man,” he growls, snarling a wordless yell before smacking me to the ground.

“Oof! You have me at a disadvantage,” I say, impacting and rolling to a crouch. “Unless…your name actually is Harry Potter, isn’t it? Don’t be embarrassed, it’s a cool name.”

“I am Jack O’Lantern!” he shouts at me. “And you won’t interfere with our plans!”

“If I had a dollar for every time a bad guy told me that, I’d be able to hire an image consultant for you,” I tell him as he presses a button on his broom, which zooms at me. I leap and dodge it effortlessly. “Because for real? Pumpkin head? Your name is Jack O’Lantern? This whole gimmick you’re doing just feels a bit lazy, derivative, you know?”

He taps a button on what looks like some kind of a wrist device, and my goggles pick up a wireless signal being sent to the broom. It arcs and flies back at him, taking another potshot at me. I spin out of the way, ducking a sudden lunge from the pumpkin-head himself. He’s fast. Not superhumanly fast, but he’s obviously well-trained in some kind of fighting style. I duck and doge a few jabs, darting under his arm and hurrying for the men that are still attempting to empty the warehouse. Ugh, doing this on my own is a bit chaotic. Normally, Harry would be kicking henchman ass while Gwen webbed up their escape route.

Spider-sense! 

Whump-BOOM!

I leap just as another explosion shatters the ground at my feet, flipping away as an idea occurs to me. I don’t need to stop the henchmen if I can stop the getaway.

“Hold still, fucker!” the girl shouts.

“Try again, Sparky-Sparky Boom Girl!” I yell back, taking off for the armored vehicles waiting to escape. Pumpkin-Head zooms overhead, and one glance shows me that he’s taking aim with some kind of rifle.

Great, more stuff to dodge.

The girl stalks around the car, holding her hands out, and I smirk under my mask.

“Aw, she wants a hug – “

Whump-BOOM!

“You know, you’re cute when you’re blowing up – “

Whump-BOOM!

“Have you ever thought about – “

Whump-BOOM!

Panting, the girl pauses and tries to catch her breath as her mom runs up to her and yanks at her arm.

“Lana, stop!” she yells. “Don’t let him bait you!”

“Lana?” I ask through a bout of chuckles. “Your name is…your name is Lana!? DANGER ZONE!”

Whump-BOOOOOM!

I jump away, but as I’m about to land, I’m snatched from the air by Mr. O’Lantern, who places a gun to my skull, making my spider-sense clang.

Yeah, I know I’m in danger, spider-sense. Where were you thirty seconds ago?

“You are getting to be a real thorn in my side, Spider!” he yells, and looking down, it’s obvious why. Thanks to Lana’s poorly-planned explosions, the road out of the plant is pockmarked with craters, making it impossible to drive those spiffy armored cars anywhere. I see his finger start to squeeze the trigger, but he doesn’t know all my tricks yet.

Zzzt-SHAFF!

“Ngah!” he shouts, seizing up, the gun firing wildly as he topples from his broom. I fall as well, swinging off of a lightpost and coming to a landing near the crowd of henchman, currently clustering near the back of one of the armored cars and clearly nonplussed as to what to do now that their escape has been cut off. As one, they raise their guns at me, and I have just enough time to realize that I’m probably not going to be able to dodge incoming spray from about seven guns when they open fire.

Right into a translucent bluish barrier that ripples as a stream of bullets connects and bounces harmlessly off.

“Yo, Spidey!” a voice says nearby, and a figure literally materializes from nowhere on my right. He’s wearing a form-fitting black getup rather like mine, complete with a mask with white eyes, with a white symbol on his chest that looks like the dotted outline of a man in a circle.

“It’s me,” he says in a loud whisper. “It’s Johnny.”

“Joh – “

“But call me Dusk when I’m in the costume!” he says, turning back to the guys with the guns, who have paused their hail of fire, either to reload or out of bemusement at the sudden arrival of a second superhero.

“So, what’s happening?” Johnny asks.

“These guys are trying to take something that’s not theirs,” I say. “There’s a guy on a flying broomstick thing that has guns and military training or something and two girls, a mom and daughter, that can blow things up with their hands.”

“Gotta love New York,” Johnny says. “Alright, I’ll cover you while you beat up – “

His words are cut off as my spider-sense clangs, and I run to him.

“Shield! Strong!”

He reacts instantly, which is awesome, a nearly opaque blue barrier forming around us as an oil tanker flies overhead, landing nearby.

WHUUUMP-BOOOOOM!

Smoke engulfs the entire area, flowing around the bubble of a barrier Johnny has us in. As it dissipates, a huge figure looms through the cloud, the ground shuddering with its footsteps.

“Oh, that’s just not fair,” I mutter, shaking my head as the Rhino materializes from the smoke. “I’ve put him in jail twice. How does he keep getting out?”

“Well, this does throw a wrench in things,” another voice says, sounding shimmery through the barrier. Johnny and I look to see the Vulture swooping to a landing nearby. “Oh, Otto will not be pleased.” 

“Hey! Back off, you old fuck!” Lana yells, running up through the dissipating smoke and glaring at the Vulture. “This is our score, and you’re not – “

“Lana!” her mom says, hurrying up. “Don’t just chat at the old bastard, fuck him up!”

“Keep that barrier up, Dusk,” I say, and he chuckles.

“It’s such a good superhero name, isn’t it?” he asks as an explosion sounds in the background. “Kinda dark but not like full-on emo.”

“Yeah, it’s super,” I say, taking his arm and pulling him away. “Now, let’s put some distance between us and them because I think we’re about to have us a Mexican standoff.”

“A what-now?”

“Two groups of bads are trying to take stuff from Roxxon,” I say. “Neither of them like us, we don’t like them, and they don’t like each other.”

“Clusterfuck,” Johnny says.

“The fuckiest.”

“I was wondering when you’d show up!” Jack O’Lantern shouts, circling overhead on his broom again, having recovered from getting tased, apparently. “The boss told me to expect a giant idiot in a rhino suit and a decrepit windbag flying around like a buzzard! You didn’t disappoint!”

He reaches for his belt, pulling out what must be a grenade of some kind and hurling it at the Rhino, who bats it aside and roars, charging for the cluster of henchmen near the armored cars. The hired hands scatter, several of them climbing into one of the vehicles and starting it up. Rhino roars and starts to charge as they reverse, but by the time he’s shifted into his quadrupedal form, the car is speeding away quite swiftly for such a cumbersome-looking vehicle.

“Cowards!” Jack O’Lantern yells, dodging as the Vulture swoops at him. “Agh! This is not how we planned this to go!”

“Do we just let them fight each other?” Johnny asks, and I shake my head.

“The henchmen are getting away, and if we let those two fight, they could hurt someone,” I say, looking around. “The only other road out of this area is across this yard. You can go block them, right?”

“On it!” Johnny says, phasing out of existence. I turn to see the Vulture and Jack O’Lantern in some kind of aerial battle that would be pretty exciting if it was a scene in like a movie or something. As it is, the two of them are a very real threat to the people in the surrounding buildings, as both of them seem fond of explosives and unconcerned about the possibility of collateral damage.

I hop onto a nearby building and scurry up the side. As I’m climbing, the Vulture dives at Jack O’Lantern, who takes a few shots with his gun before zipping out of the way. How does his broom even stay in the air? Jack O’Lantern levels a pistol at Vulture, firing a few more times, but the Vulture is nimble, at least when he’s flying, swooping in and snatching at Jack with his talons.

“Did that freak put you up to this!?” Vulture yells. “Otto won’t let him run amok for long! I would wash my hands of him if I were you!”

“Hey, ‘that freak’ pays some good money!” Jack shouts back, spinning his broom in a dodge and taking another shot. “And that’s all I care about! Now hold still, you old bastard!”

“Alright, kids, that’s enough messing around,” I say, holding my hands out and firing a couple webs at Jack O’Lantern while he has his back turned. I leap and yank myself toward him, landing on his back and causing the broom to spiral dangerously.

“You crazy son of a bitch!” Jack yells, and I tug his helmet off to reveal a shaved scalp lined with scars, like someone stuck his head through a can-opener and stitched it back together. Badly. He turns to snarl at me, and I notice several missing teeth and still more scarring all over his face. A large chunk is missing from his right ear, and his nose has been broken and healed badly at some point.

“Someone needs a nap,” I say, and he yells, raising his gun, but before he can even lift it all the way, I rear back and sock him in the face, knocking him out cold. Webbing him up, I toss him at the wall I just jumped from and attach him to it with more webs. Now crouched on his broom thing, I turn to face the Vulture.

“Spider-Man!” he says, cackling. “How is it you’re always right at the center of trouble? This had nothing to do with you, yet here you are, meddling once again in the affairs of the Superior Six!”

“I just…I just really don’t like you guys,” I say, leaping from the broom and flying in his direction, but he spins and swoops down, grabbing me in his talons, which grip my shoulders, digging into my flesh. “Ah! You need to trim your nails, old man!”

I aim my webs at his chin and fire, yanking down. He staggers in midair, his grip on me weakening as his neck is bent awkwardly low, his chin tucked right into his chest. Next, I swing my legs up and deliver a swift kick to his head, feeling his grip loosen completely as I knock him out. Webbing him up as well, I attach to a nearby smokestack and swing us both down to where Jack O’Lantern is already webbed up, leaving them both to hang.

“Now, if you two wake up and decide to fight again, I want you to use your words,” I say sternly, though as they’re both out cold, they’re not in any state to appreciate my lecture.

Kids these days.

I leap to the ground and yank that fancy broom from its lazy path to the ground, examining it before snapping it over my knee.

Can’t risk Harry Potter up there using it to escape somehow.

Now to help Johnny.

I’m just getting a running start to jump and web my way over when I hear a plaintive little yell.

“W-wait! Help.”

I stop and turn, glancing around the battle-scarred parking lot, littered with the wreckage of cars and (hopefully) unconscious bodies of Jack O’Lantern’s henchmen. I’m just about to wonder if I’m hearing voices when a small shifting movement catches my eye, a head of dark brown hair falling over a slim pair of shoulders as Lana the Sparky-Sparky Boom Girl tries to crawl toward me, but her leg is pinned under the crumpled remains of a car, which is smoking alarmingly.

“Please?” she asks, her voice soft and pitiful, a stark contrast to the sassy confidence of before.

I think I preferred the sass.

I rush toward her, kneeling and reaching for the car.

“I’m gonna lift, so can you use your good leg to push away?” I ask her, and she nods frantically, her face screwed up in pain.

“O-okay,” she stutters out in a gasp. I lift the car, which is heavy but certainly not the heaviest thing I’ve picked up. It shifts with a crackle of broken glass and creaking parts, and Lana shuffles hurriedly out from under it with a whimper, crying out and rolling onto her back.

“Agh, ow!” she whimpers. “Fuck! Ah, fuck, fuck, shit, that hurts!”

“Where’s your partner?” I ask, shooting out a stream of webs and wrapping them around her leg as an improvised tourniquet; that leg is bleeding badly and really needs some medical attention.

“Mom ran off like a fucking bitch,” she grumbles, her eyes shining with tears. “I can’t believe it. I thought it was so cool she was letting me come along on this thing, but I knew it was just so we could use our powers.”

“You can only blow stuff up when you’re around each other?” I ask, and she nods.

“I…thought she was coming around,” she huffs. “She was being nice to me, treating me like…an actual daughter.”

“No parent should put their kid in danger like that,” I say, sighing and looking her up and down. “I’d ask if you can rip some of your shirt off to wrap your leg up, but you had to go for the Lara Croft look.”

She actually blushes, pouting and crossing her arms. “Yeah, like you’re not enjoying the view?” she says. “Fucking perv.” She reaches for her shirt and tugs it over her head, revealing a tight-fitting sport bra underneath. She passes it over to me, and I wrap her leg up to staunch as much of the bleeding as I can before lifting her.

“The police should be on the way,” I tell her as I carry her away from the scene and settle her on a bench. “Keep the leg elevated, don’t put weight on it, and stay out of trouble. A girl like you has no business being a criminal.”

“Don’t you dare fucking think this means we’re in love now or some shit!” she shouts after me as I run and web up toward Johnny. He’s a member of the Terrific Trio and everything, but the Rhino and I kinda have a thing.

I’d hate for him to be beaten by another superhero.

I swing in and see Johnny perched on top of the other armored car, his leg hanging casually over the side, and he looks up at me with a jaunty little wave as I land next to him. Around him, the battlefield is littered with more knocked-out henchman and an unconscious Rhino. Knowing Aleksei Sytsevich’s capacity for charging headfirst at every problem, I imagine Johnny Storm and his ability to summon nigh-unbreakable barriers at will probably handled him easily.

“You know, I have to say, this is nice,” he says as I crouch next to him. “I mean, I’ve been all over the world, saved it a couple times, but what you do has a much more…grounded feel, I guess. I could get used to this kinda local stuff.”

“Well, there is kind of an opening on our little team,” I say with a shrug. “You’d make a good tank.”

“Tank?” he asks, glancing over at me with a confused look.

“Yeah, like…the guy that takes the heavy hits,” I say. “That’s what Tarantula did.”

“Oh, right, okay,” he says, nodding. “Like my Steelix in Omega Ruby.”

I actually laugh at that. “Johnny Storm plays Pokémon?

“Yeah, but I’m a total casual,” he says. “I mean, Sue, back in the day, she would go on about natures and IVs and EVs and type and STAB and holy shit, she would wipe my team of legendaries with a fucking…a Tyrannitar.”

“Tyrannitar’s a badass,” I tell him.

“Its name was Marshmallow,” he tells me flatly.

“Still badass,” I insist, standing. “Alright, we should get out of here, I hear sirens.”

“Are we heading back to your super-secret lair?” he asks, also climbing to his feet.

“My super-secret lair is my basement,” I tell him with a chuckle, and he shrugs.

“I bet it’s got like a super-awesome tech lab setup with all kinds of gadgets and stuff,” he says.

“Well, you’re not wrong,” I tell him with a shrug, glancing around. “So, do you have like a car or…?”

“Oh, dude, wait ‘til you see it!” he says excitedly. “So, I need a lift up to that rooftop.”

He gestures to a small office building on the campus, and I shrug, glancing at him.

“Are you comfortable with me giving you a piggyback ride?” I ask him, and he just puts his hands on his hips.

“As long as we never tell anyone else about it, especially Ben, ever,” he says, and I roll my eyes.

“Well, that’s just a given.”

He hops on, his weight negligible at best, like my backpack with all of my books packed inside. I swing us over to the rooftop he indicated, and he hurries over to pick up what I immediately recognize as a Stark wingsuit, like the ones I saw at Oscorp, slinging it onto his shoulders. It fits itself to his shoulders and waist, the wings extending and curling up, ready for takeoff.

“Where did you get that?” I ask. The Terrific Trio is a nonprofit, and it’s really difficult for a civilian to purchase a wingsuit, even if you do have the money.

“Oh, I saved some guy while we were in Budapest, and he just gave it to me,” he says, shrugging. “I can’t use it in battle because I can’t turn it invisible and my barriers would fuck with it, but it’ll help me keep up with you when you’re swinging all over the place. So…your place?”

“Um…” I trail off, not sure if I’m ready for Johnny to know who I am. Sensing my hesitation, he holds his hands up.

“Hey, dude, we don’t have to,” he says. “You could come back to the Baxter Building, if you want. You don’t have to take off your mask or anything.”

I sigh, shaking my head. “Nah, you…you saved my life today. Those guys probably would have put a lot of bullets in me, and…yeah, there would have been a few really unhappy people back home. Plus, you helped get that thing away from Taran—from Harry.”

He just shrugs. “Well, most of the other superheroes I know are like thirty, so…you know, super-kids gotta stick together, I guess,” he says. “Plus, I really like what you’re doing. Saving people. It – “

“Freeze!” a megaphone-enhanced voice yells, and we turn to see a police cruiser on the curb below us, an officer yelling up at us. “Spider-Man, you and your accomplice put your hands above your heads!”

“Is he serious?” Johnny asks.

“Unfortunately,” I say. “Spider-phone, map, home.”

My HUD blinks and calculates the route home, a small arrow appear in my view, pointing me slightly to my left.

“’Spider-phone?” Johnny asks, snickering.

“I didn’t exactly have time to come up with a cool name,” I say. “You ready to run?”

“Always.”

“Alright, follow me.”

……

From: Gwenjamin Franklin

[saw you on the news! Was that Johnny Storm?]

To: Gwenjamin Franklin

[Yeah, he showed up and saved my bacon from some crazy pumpkin-head.]

[Tell you more when we get there.]

From: Gwenjamin Franklin

[We? Pete, are you bringing him home?]

To: Gwenjamin Franklin

[Yeah, I mean, he’s come through for us twice now.]

[Without him, I might not have been able to save Harry. And he saved my life again today.]

From: Gwenjamin Franklin

[well, alright. You do need a lot of saving for a superhero, though. :P ]

To: Gwenjamin Franklin

[If it was easy, everyone would do it.]

From: Gwenjamin Franklin

[just get back here so I can worry about you in person.]

“Is that the Black Widow?” Johnny asks as we walk from the park back to my place. He’s tucked his blonde locks into a beanie and put on a pair of baggy sweats and a zip-up hoody over his costume, transforming him into exactly the sort of person you’d see wandering Queens.

“Yeah, my girlfriend,” I say, smiling as I pocket my phone. He just chuckles.

“This is still blowing my mind,” he says with a shake of his head. “You’re younger than me. I mean, like…way younger.”

“Two years is not ‘way younger’,” I say.

“It is in high school years,” he says. “You’re still a freshman, and I’d be like…a junior.”

“You don’t go to school?” I ask him, and he shrugs.

“Sue tutors me when she can, but…we’re busy a lot,” he says. “She’s been getting on me to finish my education, though, get a diploma, go to college. She doesn’t want this world-saving stuff to get in the way of a ‘normal life’. Like I can have a normal life.”

“Normal went out the window for both of us,” I say. “That’s like…asking a butterfly to just live a normal life as a caterpillar.”

“Or, or…fuck, that’s the best one I’ve heard,” he says, looking blankly ahead as we walk. “Anyway, I think I would like to go back to school, but not as Johnny Storm. I mean, don’t get me wrong, being famous is pretty awesome. I love it, I love saving people, but I’m shallow and stuff, so I also like the attention. But I want the kind of fame you have, like…you can take it off and just go home and be Peter Parker.”

I roll my eyes as we reach my backyard, heading for the cellar door and pulling it open. “Believe me, being Peter Parker isn’t that great all the time,” I tell him as we walk down the stairs.

“Pete!”

“Peter!”

Two sets of arms wrap around me, Gwen hugging my shoulders and Mary Jane sort of hugging both of us from behind me. Gwen kisses me softly, pulling away and shooting a questioning look at Mary Jane, who just shrugs sheepishly, her arms jerking away.

“Worried,” she says meekly. “Sorry.”

“Yeah, no, you’re just wrong,” Johnny says. “Being Peter Parker looks pretty great.”

……

Just like that, Dusk is added to the roster of our little Spider-Trio, and Johnny Storm is added to my roster of friends. It’s refreshing to have a guy friend again after a week without Harry. Gwen and MJ are awesome, but I’d like a friend I don’t have undertones of sexual tension with.

Unless Johnny is into guys.

That would just be awkward to find out.

Johnny takes spiritedly to fighting “street-level crime”, as he calls it. His shield powers come in handy more than a few times, and if it wasn’t for his ability to turn invisible, the time we helped break up a hostage situation at a bank would have turned sour pretty quickly.

As for Tony’s challenge, well…designing the Jackpot armor has actually been a lot of fun. I can’t exactly make it a million-dollar set of Stark armor, but that’s not really what we need, either. We’re a ragtag bunch of superpowered misfits, not a clandestine organization fighting threats to national security.

Leave that to SHIELD and their friends.

So, something that can stand up to a fight against a guy like the Ringer or a bunch of henchmen but can also help get away if the Rhino gets involved. I can’t help but make it sort of spider-themed, giving it four retractable legs in the back. I briefly consider giving her some webshooters, but the strain on MJ’s muscles would be painful, not to mention that she lacks the enhanced reaction time and attention to detail that web-swinging requires. Maybe repulsors to boost her jumping?

I actually really want to see this suit in action now.

“Oh, that’s looking awesome!” Mary Jane says, peering over my shoulder as I sketch out a design one afternoon. Gwen is once again helping out with the yearbook (she promises it’s the last time she’ll be pulled away), and Johnny is actually going through the process of enrolling at Midtown High.

“If I’m gonna go to school, I at least wanna go with people that aren’t total douche-tools,” is his reasoning, apparently.

Sound reasoning, actually.

“It’s collapsible, too, so when you’re not in full armor mode, it’ll just look like you really like to accessorize,” I tell her. “You’ll need a suit under your clothes, like we wear, but that shouldn’t be a problem. I’ll also need to know, um….”

“Um, what?” she asks, quirking an eyebrow at me.

“Your…” I gesture at her, feeling my face heat up. “You know, information, like….”

She smirks knowingly at me, spinning my chair around and facing me head-on, looking far too amused. “Which information, Pete?”

“You know what information,” I challenge her, and she giggles, giving me a toothy smile.

“I know,” she says. “But I wanna hear you say it.”

“I need your measurements,” I bite out, and she sticks her tongue out.

“Was that so hard?” she asks.

“Extremely,” I grumble, spinning away from her again.

She reaches over me, giving me a waft of her perfume, and grabs the pen out of my hand, scribbling down her measurements.

“I don’t ever wanna hear that you told anyone about these,” she warns me with a little frown. “Modesty is a girl’s last virtue.”

“Says the girl whose OC runs a burlesque house?” I say, glancing up at her. She huffs, poking me in the nose.

“That’s different,” she says loftily. “That’s empowerment. Those girls are in control of the situation.”

“Clearly I’m out of my depth,” I admit, and MJ smiles, shaking her head. “So, what kind of logo do you want? Every superhero needs some kind of logo or symbol.”

“Well, my name is Jackpot,” she says. “What about triple sevens?”

I nod; that would make sense. Triple sevens are the symbol of the jackpot in most –

Triple sevens?

In a flash, the block-lettered note from one of my secret admirers comes to mind.

I’M SORRY, AND PLEASE DON’T TRY TO FIND OUT WHO THIS IS.

777

It could, of course, be a giant coincidence, but as I look up and spot the fearful look on MJ’s face as she realizes what she just let slip, I’m inclined to not think so.

I’m also just as inclined to completely disregard it for the sake of keeping everyone happy.

“That would look pretty cool,” I say. “Right across the chest piece.”

“Y-yeah,” she says with a smile that looks only slightly forced. “Um…yeah, I think that would look awesome. And the, um…the armor could be like black and gold…and some red?”

“I like it,” I say, scrawling down a few notes. I look up to see her looking relieved that I’ve either forgotten the implications of the triple-sevens or I’m just moving past it.

I do not need that kind of drama in my life.

Again.

For the next few hours or so, I’m absorbed in at least four separate programs on my computer, rendering the various patterns, functions, material requirements, and software required for functionality of the armor. It’s…complicated, to be sure, and six months ago, I would have balked at such a task, dismissed it as far too demanding. Heck, I probably would’ve been secretly glad I didn’t have the hardware or software to even conceive such a design.

But now I have no excuse other than my own laziness, and that’s not good enough. With great power, etcetera.

Gwen and Johnny show up at some point, but Mary Jane quietly informs them that I’m “in the zone”, so they just chat amongst themselves, Gwen occasionally bringing me a drink or a snack or something. Finally, all I’m left with is a loading bar that zips by thanks to Tony’s most recent gift, a computer with enough processing power to run two floors at Oscorp. I scoot my chair back and spin to show MJ her newest armor –

But it’s just Gwen, lounging on my bed with her laptop, wearing a long nightshirt that leaves her smooth, bare legs exposed, and I’m really glad I didn’t get a look at those before I started working, because hoo-boy….

I’d be distracted.

“Where is everyone?” I ask, and she looks up, smiling when she sees I’m apparently done. The basement is dark, a single hanging lamp lighting my work area, so she’s illuminated only by the soft white glow of her laptop screen.

“Pete, it’s past midnight,” she tells me with a small laugh, standing and making her way over to settle into my lap. She curls up against me and eyes the screen. “Everyone’s gone home. I already ‘left’ and snuck back in through the basement, and Aunt May even called goodnight. Wow, that looks really cool.”

“You think MJ’ll like it?” I ask, and she nods.

“Pete, it’s amazing,” she says in an awed voice. “And…that’s like…that’s actually gonna work like that once it’s made?”

“I hope so,” I say with a laugh. “We won’t know for sure until we try it out, but I think so. The main chest-torso thing will be in a belt and a collapsible unit small enough to carry in her backpack. It’ll look like a big binder, and the metal should be light enough that it’s only a bout as heavy as a textbook. The gauntlets will collapse into bracelets, and the feet will be included in the binder thing, and so will the back of her head. The facemask will be a necklace.”

“Well, MJ already loves that Etsy accessory stuff, so this’ll be perfect for her,” Gwen says with a smile, nuzzling into my neck and planting a mint-chocolate-flavored kiss on my lips.

“Were you eating my Thin Mints?” I ask, scandalized. She gasps theatrically, looking like a girl with her hand caught in the cookie jar.

“No, never!” she says in a shocked tone. “That you would even accuse me of such barbarism is insulting!”

“Off with your head!” I say, scooping her up and carrying her squealing over to my bed, where I drop her onto the mattress and crawl over her. She giggles and pulls me in for another kiss, her hand running down my chest to tickle my stomach, making me squirm away. “Ah, she’s got tricks up her sleeve.”

“Well, you guards are always so easy to charm,” she says with a smile. “Or maybe it’s just the goofy spider-guard with those adorable baby-blues.”

“He can never stay mad at the feminine wiles of the cunning Black Widow,” I say, and she smirks, pulling me into a hug and rolling so we’re lying on our sides, facing each other. She slings her leg over my hips, and I just have enough time to catch a flash of the color pink –

Before my phone chimes loudly from my pocket, the emergency noise for urgent news updates. Gwen rolls her eyes and shifts away from me, fixing me with a curious look as I dig the phone out and check.

“Oh, shit,” I say, glancing at her. “Suit up. Superpowered baddy tearing up…wait, that can’t be right.”

……

“Why is a guy zapping up Jess’s old street with electric powers?” Gwen asks as we hop roofs across Queens, swinging when we can, but the low buildings and suburban areas don’t allow for much webbing to be done.

“I couldn’t tell you,” I say as we reach the street in question. “It…it has to be a coincidence, though. I mean, unless…wait, Flash!”

“Oh, I forgot!” Gwen gasps, landing on a chimney and swinging webbing off a tall lightpost before coming to a stop on the sidewalk, where I land next to her. “Flash lives here, too! Do you think…? This couldn’t have anything to do with him, could it?”

“The way our lives work, I’d be more shocked if it didn’t,” I tell her, and she sighs.

“Why do I feel like you’re right?”

We take the last few yards at a run, confident we’re heading the right way when an old couple hurries down the street in our direction.

“S-Spidey!” the old man yells, coming to a stop in front of us. “You here to help us?”

“We’ll do what we can,” I tell him. “What happened? Can you tell us anything?”

“The Thompson kid, across the street,” he says. “We were in our living room, when his house just…kaboom. It was like the mother of all power surges. The whole street went dark, and he came running outside, electricity just bolting off of him like a downed power line. I think he might be one’a them mutants.”

“Alright, keep moving that way, call the police, tell them they might wanna get in touch with the X-Men,” I say, and he nods.

“Good luck, Spidey!” he calls as they run away. “I always knew you was a good guy!”

We continue down the street, coming upon Flash’s house, which I only vaguely remember from the party months ago. It looks…worse for wear. Most of the top floor has been blown off, and a few small fires have started. In the middle of the street, Flash himself is kneeling in pajama pants and a t-shirt. His parents are nearby, his mom being restrained by his dad.

“Rosie, it’s too dangerous!” he yells.

“He needs us!” his mom yells. At her feet, a small girl, no older than eleven or twelve, is sobbing, clinging to her mother’s leg. “Flash, Mama’s here! You’re gonna be okay!”

“What do we do?” Gwen asks softly in my ear.

“Talk him down?” I ask, shrugging. “The suits are insulated, so he can’t really zap us too bad.”

“Well…you talk,” she says, taking my arm. “I’ll be right behind you.”

I take a few steps forward as another few arcs of electricity sprout from Flash, zapping the street. As we near him, I notice his skin is glowing blue, his eyes washed out to two bright glowing orbs, and his clothes are singed, a new hole burned through them with every electrical arc.

“Flash?” I call to him. “Flash Thompson?”

He looks up, gasping, and a larger bolt of electricity courses out, but it’s pulled away by the metal streetlamp nearby. The bulb bursts, causing Flash’s family to collectively yelp in surprise as a shower of sparks and burned glass falls to the street.

“S…Spider-Man?” he asks, his voice sounding strangely…garbled, like it’s going through an auto-tuner and pitched slightly lower. “No…you…you gotta get away, Spider-Man! I might…I don’t wanna hurt anyone!”

“I understand, Flash, I know,” I say. “I…I’m just here to help, alright? I mean, you’re my biggest fan, right?”

He gasps, his glowing eyes widening. “You know about me?” he asks, and I’m glad to see some of the electric bolts arcing off of him dissipate, shrinking down until they’re just racing along his skin. “You…for real?”

“Yeah, I’m flattered, man,” I say, taking a few steps closer. “Looks like you’re…having some trouble, though. I just wanted to come by and see if I could help.”

“I-I don’t know what’s happening,” he says, shaking his head. “I was having a bad dream, and when I woke up, it was like…everything just felt weird. I felt like…” his hands start to crackle and spark, and he lets a surprised sound, clenching his fingers into fists. “Ah! It…I’m sorry, I – “

“No, no, it’s okay,” I tell him. “I know what it’s like, believe me. I didn’t always have my powers. Widow didn’t either. One day, would you believe we got bit by radioactive spiders? Woke up with these powers and no idea what was happening.”

“You did?” he asks me, and I nod.

“Both of us, right, Widow?” I ask, looking back, and Gwen walks up, crouching in front of Flash.

“You’re not alone, Flash,” she tells him. “We went through something similar, and we got out of it just fine. You’ll be okay. We’ll find you some help.”

“Actually, with mutants, help usually finds you,” a voice says behind us, and I jump, spinning to see two girls and a guy standing nearby, wearing matching black and yellow uniforms with X insignias emblazoned on the front.

“Holy shit,” I say softly. The girl in the lead giggles, fixing me with a doe-eyed smile as she tucks a lock of curly brown hair behind an ear.

“Yeah, we get that a lot,” she says, turning to the guy next to her. “Hank, what do you think?”

Behind her, a huge man steps forward, and I don’t use the phrase “built like a linebacker” too often, but he is. The Rock has nothing on Hank, whoever he is.

“That’s Hank McCoy,” the other girl says. She’s probably about as old as Felicia, the Black Cat, though with red hair to rival MJ’s. She looks at me with an amused smile, canting her head to the side. “Who’s MJ?”

“I…what?” I ask, and she smiles, putting a finger to her lips. 

“Sorry, mind-reader,” she says. “Sometimes I catch surface thoughts by accident, and well, it can be hard to figure out if it was said out loud or in your head.”

“That’s…disturbing on a few levels,” I say.

“I know, right?” she says. “Anyway, I’m Jean, the Marvel Girl. Like I said, that’s Hank, the Beast. And the girl with little hearts in her eyes is Kitty Pryde, Shadowcat. She’s a big fan.”

“Only slightly,” Kitty Pryde says defensively, blushing.

“You have like three posters,” Jean insists.

“They have posters of me?” I ask incredulously.

“Well, she made one herself,” Jean says with a sidelong glance at her partner.

“Jean, I think it’s time you stopped talking for like a year,” Kitty says, her face red.

“When did they start making posters?” I ask. “Where do they get the pictures?”

“You didn’t know about them?” Jean asks. “You don’t get any, like, money from them?”

“I wish,” I say, slightly outraged. Gwen walks up to us, and I turn to her. “Did you know they have posters of me?”

“You didn’t?” she asks, sounding amused. “What, you’ve seen shirts and hats and necklaces and stuff, but you draw the line at posters?”

“Well, shirts and stuff have the symbol,” I say, gesturing at the spider symbol on my chest. “Posters are pictures of actual me.”

“There’s posters of me, too, you know,” Gwen says. “I’m over it. Tarantula’s over his. Iron Man prints his own.”

“Oh, you guys really know Iron Man?” Jean asks excitedly. “What’s he like?”

“So full of himself it’s spilling out his ears,” I say, turning back to watch Hank McCoy calmly escorting Flash over to is parents. “What’s going on over there?”

“The big guy talked Flash down and gave him this like rubber blanket thing to make sure he doesn’t zap anything,” Gwen says. “He’s gonna talk to his parents now, and I think he’s gonna go off and be an X-Man.”

“Sounds X-iting,” I say, and Gwen groans, socking my playfully in the shoulder while Kitty Pryde snorts and bursts out laughing.

“Oh my gosh, Spider-Man’s a dork,” she giggles. “This is perfect.”

“Jeez, now she’s in love with you,” Jean mutters, shaking her head. “I’m gonna go make sure Hank has Zappy over there reined in.”

She walks off, leaving the three of us, Kitty Pryde still giggling softly as she looks up at us with those big puppy-dog eyes.

Those are gonna be a problem.

“So, do you wanna come back to the mansion with us?” she asks. “You guys are friends with him or something, right?”

“Sort of,” Gwen says.

“He’s a fan, too,” I tell her.

“Well, you’re welcome to stop by, but…it’s also like one in the morning, so I understand if you don’t wanna,” she says, smiling at us. “Um…I can talk to Professor Xavier tomorrow, maybe get you guys an early ride out? This is probably pretty crazy for him, so it’ll be nice to see a friend.”

“That…would actually be pretty cool,” I say, glancing at Gwen, who folds her arms in a distinctly huffy gesture. “What? The X-Men home base! How awesome would it be to see it!?”

She shakes her head, giggling a bit. “Well, our identities are kind of a thing we wanna keep secret, so….”

“Um, right,” Kitty says, nodding and glancing toward us. “Well, tell you what, um….” She reaches for her belt, taking a small device that looks like the key fob for a car key. “Take this. And I’ll tell the Professor that you guys wanna come by? If…you know, if you actually do? No pressure.”

“A little pressure,” Jean Gray says, strolling back over and giving Kitty an amused smirk as she leans heavily on the shorter girl’s shoulder. “I already brain-called the Professor, and he’s totally okay with it.”

I glance over at Gwen. “I mean, tomorrow’s Saturday, so we could do that,” I tell her. “And it’d be nice for Flash to see someone familiar. Plus, like…reiterating here, the X-Mansion.”

Gwen just giggles, shaking her head and bopping me on the head.

“Noon?” she asks, looking to Kitty, who just nods.

“Perfect,” she says. “Um, so…nice meeting you.”

“Yeah, thanks for helping Flash out,” I say, and she just shrugs, hunching her shoulders and smiling up at me.

“It’s what we do,” she says. “So…see you tomorrow.”

She lets herself be pulled away by Jean Gray, over to the middle of the street where Hank is waiting with Flash. Above the street, a high-tech looking jet of sorts hovers silently, yellow gridlines glowing along it as a hatch opens, spilling out even more yellow light onto the three X-Men and Flash, who waves at his family. His parents wave back, his mom sobbing quietly as his little sister frantically swings both arms.

“Bye, Genie!” she yells.

“Genie?” Gwen asks with a small laugh.

“I’m keeping that one,” I say. “Flash is Genie now.”

We watch as the foursome is pulled up into the jet, which closes up and lifts into the air, taking off silently into the sky, bound eastward.

“So, we’re friends with X-Men now,” Gwen says as we watch it shrink into the distance. She turns to look at me. “And Kitty Pryde has an insane crush on you.”

“Gwen, how do I turn it off?” I ask, shaking my head. “What am I even doing that this many girls find so crush-worthy?”

“It’s kinda just the whole thing,” she says, shrugging. “You’re like this perfect combination of dorky, sexy, and like…heroic. I dunno, it works.”

“It works way too well,” I say as we start to head for home at a more sedate pace. I sigh, shaking my head. “So, Genie is an X-Man, Johnny Storm is part of our little friend-group-slash-superhero-circle, and Mary Jane is on the way to becoming a street-level Iron Man.”

“To quote one of Harry’s favorite songs, this is what it’s like when worlds collide,” Gwen says.

“The name of that band, though,” I say. “Powerman 5000. Like…props on the name, if nothing else.”

Gwen yawns, leaning against me and sighing. “Can we go home and just sleep forever?”

“Well, we have a date with Flash tomorrow,” I say. “And then we have to stop by Oscorp and drop off the plans for the Jackpot armor.”

“We need a vacation,” Gwen pouts.

“There is no vacation from justice,” I say in a deep voice, and she just bops my nose.

“Alright, Crimson Chin,” she says. “Let’s just get home and sleep while we can. And this time, turn your damn phone off.”

“But what if justice calls?” I ask petulantly.

“I’m not wearing anything under this suit, and I’m feeling way too lazy to put my pajamas back on,” she says flatly.

“Justice can leave a message.”


	2. Chapter 2

I have to say, as far as highlights of my short career as a superhero go, getting picked up by the X-Men’s Blackbird is one of the biggest so far.

 

Saturday morning finds us in a park near Flash’s house, which was the best location we could pick that didn’t involve an hour-long web-swinging trip, and while I don’t really want the X-Men to work out who we are or where we live, I’m not going to go to Jason Bourne levels of paranoid to keep them from it.

 

Charles Xavier can probably pick the information right out of our heads anyway.

 

It’s weird, realizing we’re going to a place full of people…well, like us. People with powers above and beyond the average person. Heck, Professor Xavier even went and coined a Latin term for them: _homo sapiens superior_.

 

A little arrogant, if I do say so myself, but I guess it’s hard to deny that if you compare someone like Cyclops or Iceman to the average everyday Joe, there’s an obvious choice who’s physically superior.

 

Though, from what I hear about Iceman, he’s not the brightest bulb.

 

Anyway, rambling.

 

The Blackbird, which is one of the few things that makes me think there’s someone in this world as smart as Tony Stark, hovers silently overhead, and just as yesterday, yellow lines light up along it as the lower hatch opens and bathes the ground beneath it in yellow light.

 

“Ooooh, this is weird,” Gwen says as a feeling of weightlessness takes over, and we’re suddenly floating upward, like we’re in a swimming pool without the water. “This is the weirdest. We’re being abducted.”

 

“We could say ‘Take us to your leader’, but they already are,” I say, and Gwen just snorts a laugh, attempting to reach out and punch my shoulder, but she just overbalances and begins spinning a bit.

 

“Okay, next time, let’s ask if they can just send a car,” she says as we reach the jet itself. The hatch closes beneath us, and we’re slowly deposited to the floor, where Kitty Pryde is waiting for us with a bright smile on her face.

 

“Hey, guys!” she says, turning toward the cockpit. “Follow me, alright? We’ll get you strapped in, then we can talk.”

 

She leads us to a cluster of seats around an extremely sophisticated-looking control panel. Jean Gray is piloting, and sitting shotgun is a woman we haven’t met yet. She has dark, chocolate-colored skin and starkly contrasting white hair. Her eyes are nearly the same color, a bright silver that almost washes them of color. She _would_ be an intimidating woman if she wasn’t wearing a warm smile when she greets us.

 

“Good day, you two,” she says, her voice carrying just a hint of an accent I can’t quite place. “I’m Ororo.”

 

“Oh, I’m gonna have trouble with that one,” I say, shaking my head as I’m guided to a seat and strapped in by Kitty, whose hands fumble a bit as they work the buckles, one of the clasps actually dropping _through_ her hand at one point. “Do you have a nickname?”

 

Ororo laughs, probably used to similar reactions, and nods. “Storm.”

 

“I like it,” I say. “I’m Spider-Man. This is Black Widow, but we’re thinking of calling her Spider-Woman.”

 

“Just thinking,” Gwen says, her voice playfully defensive as Kitty straps her in next. “I came up with Black Widow, and I’m quite attached to it, thank you very much.”

 

“Take us out, Jeanie,” Kitty says, settling into a seat and buckling herself in. The jet takes off, and for a moment, I’m pushed into my seat, but my body adjusts to the forward force. The ground shrinks away beneath us, and we hurtle eastward.

 

“This is your captain speaking,” Jeanie says cheerily, smiling back at us. “We’ve reached our cruising altitude. You’re now free to move about the cockpit, but…unless you have to go to the bathroom, there’s not much to do. Sorry.”

 

“This is amazing,” I breathe, unbuckling and standing, making my way to the control console but making sure to keep my hands off. “This is…how is this thing staying in the air? It has to be something at least _similar_ to repulsor technology. Zero-point energy fields?”

 

“Wow, very good,” Jean says, nodding. “Yeah, we have a lot of brainiacs back home that come up with all kinds of neat stuff for us to show off to the muggles.”

 

“How did you manage to keep it contained to a stable field?” I ask. “How fast can this thing go, you know, without completely breaking down the molecular structure of anything in it? How fast can it go _at the risk_ of molecular breakdown? Theoretically, I mean…FTL travel could be possible, _time-travel_ , even, if the field is strong enough to break down quantum barriers and maintain stasis inside the – “

 

“Spidey, honey,” Gwen says, giggling. “Stop pestering the nice lady with your adorkable science questions, okay? She didn’t design the jet; she just flies it.”

 

“Is he always like that?” Kitty asks, her voice amused.

 

“You should see when he’s in his lab,” Gwen says, though she sounds nothing but affectionate as she talks about my science-nerdiness. “I ask him what he’s doing, and he just….”

 

“Prattles?” Kitty supplies for her, and Gwen nods.

 

“Yeah, that’s a good one,” she says. “He prattles.”

 

“It’s cute,” Kitty says.

 

“It really is,” Gwen agrees, patting the seat I vacated, and I make my way back over, sitting next to them.

 

“So, you two know each other outside of the spider thing?” Kitty asks, and I nod.

 

“We’ve been friends since we were kids,” I tell her.

 

“How long have you been dating?” Kitty asks, smiling over at us.

 

“Month?” I ask. “Two months? I dunno, we’ve been best friends for so long, the dating just kinda blends with everything else. Just more…couple-ish things.”

 

“That’s actually really sweet,” Kitty says with a warm smile at us. “Um, so…what happened to the Tarantula, though? I mean…if it’s not, like super painful to talk about or anything.”

 

“No, it’s…I mean, it’s just…more sad than anything,” Gwen says, glancing at me. “Pe – uh, Spidey?”

 

“His powers got a little out of hand,” I say. “Dangerous. We found a cure, or…well, a way to get rid of them, I guess. ‘Cure’ makes it sound like our powers are some kind of disease. They’re just….”

 

“A burden,” Kitty says, nodding. “Yeah, we meet a lot of mutants with that…outlook.”

 

“His burden got to be too much,” I say. “It started to get dangerous for other people so…so he did the responsible thing.”

 

“He got rid of them,” Kitty says with another nod.

 

“Yeah,” I say. “It was difficult, but…we’re both proud of him. Sometimes, the most responsible thing to do with this great power you’ve been given is to…put it back.”

 

“I know a lot of people who wish they could do that,” Kitty says, nodding.

 

“What about you?” I ask, glancing over at her. “You have like…phasing powers or something, right? You phased through my seatbelt.”

 

“Ah! I was hoping you didn’t notice!” she says with a sheepish little smile. “Yeah, um…I can like phase through stuff and actually alter my molecular density so I can walk on air and stuff.”

 

“That’s pretty badass,” I say, and she ducks her head, smiling a dimply smile at me.

 

“You think so?” she asks. “I mean, it’s pretty cool. It’s not, like…shooting giant icicles or fireballs or laser-eyes, but – “

 

“Powers aren’t always about being flashy,” I say, and Kitty nods.

 

“That’s what _I_ keep saying, but Bobby’s all like, ‘Can you do this?’ and then he does this ice surfboard thing around the mansion, and I just wanna…hurt him,” she mutters.

 

“Well, for what it’s worth, Spider-Man thinks you’re way more awesome than Iceman,” I say, and she bounces happily in her seat.

 

“Worth a lot,” she sings out.

 

Soon enough, we arrive at the X-Mansion, the jet taking us into a long underground tunnel through the Cliffside before landing in an enormous underground hangar that actually gives me a touch of vertigo as we disembark.

 

“The hell else do you guys fly?” I ask, and Kitty smirks.

 

“That’s semi-classified,” she says, placing a hand between my shoulders and directing me toward what looks like a very tiny subway platform leading to another underground tunnel.

 

“I feel like we’re gonna get the Men in Black memory wipe treatment after this,” Gwen mutters, and Jean giggles.

 

“I mean, we _could_ do that, but Professor Xavier trusts you guys, so we’ll go on the honor system for now,” she says, winking at us and gesturing at a small monorail car. “All aboard.”

 

“How much you wanna bet there’s like this elaborate James Bond villain underground base full of like next-level technology and super-secret training rooms and stuff?” I ask Gwen as we settle into seats on the monorail.

 

“You’re not wrong,” Jean says, and as we take off, I glance around, noticing we’re down a person.

 

“Where’s Storm?” I ask.

 

“She’s…not fond of the monorail,” Kitty says with a little smile. “She’s not big on enclosed spaces, and a mile-long underground tunnel is pretty enclosed.”

 

“It’s okay, she can fly,” Jean said, waving an airy hand. “Besides her boyfriend-type-thing is here visiting from Wakanda, so she wanted to cut out as soon as possible. Professor X just wanted her to come along on this trip to make sure the flight went smoothly.”

 

“Just for us?” I ask, and Kitty smiles.

 

“You’re guests,” she says. “He loves having company.”

 

“What’s he like?” I ask as we zoom along, coming to a slow stop at the other end of the tunnel quite a bit sooner than I thought it would take to cover a mile.

 

“He’s a little intimidating sometimes, but he’s actually just a sweet old guy,” Kitty says with a laugh as we stand and step off the car, where a short hallway with glass tube of an elevator greets us. “Okay, after this elevator, I swear, we’re there.”

 

“Do you have to do this every time you come back from a mission?” I ask, and she rolls her eyes.

 

“Every. Single. Time.”

 

“I’m so sorry,” I tell her, and she smirks.

 

“Some missions are more worth it than others,” she says, tapping a button on the elevator control panel. With a pneumatic hiss, the elevator ascends, a glass door smoothly opening up and allowing us inside. We shoot upward, ascending into a dark tube dimly light by little pinpricks of lights, before we arrive in a decent-sized room lined with old wooden bookshelves and fancy vintage couches and lounges. Well-kept antique lamps are placed through the room, but they’re turned off, as the afternoon sun is streaming through a large window along the wall.

 

I just have time to take this in before my attention is diverted by Flash Thompson, displaying his usual exuberance as he greets me.

 

“Spidey!” he shouts as he hurries forward. “What’s up man? Dude, this is unbelievable! Spider-Man, visiting _me_. I’m actually like really embarrassed that _that_ was how we met, like…with me all doing that electro-whatever stuff and you trying to talk me down. But, like…huge fan!”

 

Wow, he talks as much as me when he’s excited.

 

“Uh, I just…wanted to check up on you, make sure you were settling in well,” I tell him, and he nods eagerly.

 

“Yeah, man, the X-Men are pretty awesome. Dude,” he leans in conspiratorially. “Kitty Pryde has a hardcore crush on you – “

 

“Eugene!” Kitty says, her face turning pink. “We just met fourteen hours ago and _this_ is the impression you wanna make?”

 

“I’m just looking out for Spidey!” Flash says, smirking and clapping me on the shoulder. “Dude’s probably got chicks all over the place wanting his attention, eh?”

 

He’s not wrong.

 

“I mean…Black Widow and I are a thing, so…” I trail off, not wanting to say the wrong thing in front of Gwen.

 

“Oh, shit,” Flash says, holding his hands up. “I mean, at least you guys get plenty of time together, right?”

 

“True,” Gwen says, stepping forward. “So, everything’s going well for you, though?”

 

He nods, grinning at us. “This place is awesome,” he says. “I mean, it’s like this super fancy like Teddy Roosevelt summer house kinda place, _and_ it’s got all kinds of awesome X-Men stuff. And there’s this guy, Bobby Drake, the Iceman? We’re already broing down. He skateboards, too! Just like Harry! Um…this kid I know. Or knew. I mean, he’s alive, just…had to get away after some stuff, I guess.”

 

“That’s, uh, awesome,” I say. “I mean, that you’ve made a friend already.’  


“Yeah, and get this,” he says eagerly. “I met Professor X! He’s actually really awesome, like a really cool grandpa but also British. We had tea together.”

 

“Oh, yeah, Professor Xavier loves him some tea,” Kitty says, following us as we stroll through the halls.

 

“Hey, so does Spidey,” Gwen says, nudging me. “Maybe you should have tea with him sometime.”

 

“Actually,” a voice says from behind us, “I was hoping we could. If Mr. Thompson would pardon me some of the company of his idol and his companion. You’re free to join us, of course.”

 

Flash smiles, and we all turn to see Professor Charles Xavier sitting there in a fairly innocuous looking wheelchair. I have to believe it has all kinds of crazy low-key gadgets and gizmos in it. The professor himself looks…almost _too_ normal. His head is clean-shaven, but otherwise, he looks like any other older fellow I might see rolling through Walmart or something, albeit sharply dressed in a green jacket with a pale blue tie, a blanket draped over his knees.

 

“Good day, Spider-Man,” he says with a friendly smile. “Black Widow. It’s a pleasure to meet you both.”

 

“Um…likewise,” I say, and Gwen nods.

 

“So, tea?” he asks. “Vanilla chai with plenty of milk and sugar?”

 

Of course, the master of minds is probably able to pick anything out of my head. Does that mean he knows my identity? Probably. He doesn’t seem the type to blab.

 

Heck, he can probably hear me thinking all this right now.

 

“Uh, tea sounds great,” I say, glancing over at Flash, who just grins.

 

“Tea party!”

……

 

Norman Osborn had never wanted to be a hero. Sure, he wanted to be remembered, he wanted to change the world, and if that got him labeled a hero, that was the way the dice fell. But he’d never set out with the explicit purpose of being a hero.

 

Now, though, it looked like he was getting his chance.

 

“So, when does the little seminar begin?” Tony asked. “If this is one of those pyramid schemes where I sell weight loss wraps, I’m out of here. I’ve had to cut too many people out of my life because of that stuff.”

 

“Mr. Stark, we’re being invited to join some kind of superhero coalition,” Sue Storm said from across the table, where she sat with her partner, Ben Grimm. “This isn’t just some kind of lecture. We’re doing world-changing stuff, here.”

 

“I’m sure he’s aware of the gravity of the situation,” Norman said with a wry look at Tony, who just winked back. “Tony is a man who always looks at the lighter side of life.”

 

Tony’s response was cut off by the door to Norman’s meeting room opening. Nick Fury stepped in, followed by an older fellow. Even older than Dr. Connors, he still had the powerful, no-nonsense look of a man that’s spent his entire life in the military, though this was at odds with the kindly smile on his face as he surveyed them. He wore a dark blue SHIELD uniform that was highly decorated with ribbons, medals, and other commendations.

 

“Good morning, everyone,” he said. “Thanks for agreeing to meet with me today. I’m James Rogers, Director of SHIELD. You’ve all met Nick Fury, my Deputy Director.”

 

He stepped inside, moving to the head of the room, framing himself against the Manhattan skyline. Nick Fury shut the door and remained by it, leaning against the wall.

 

“So,” Director Rogers said, turning to face them, “first of all, in any official capacity, this meeting is not happening. I’m not here. As far as SHIELD is concerned, I’m taking some well-deserved personal time at an undisclosed location. Nick and I took extensive measures to make sure we weren’t being followed, and I’m given to understand that this building is secure, Mr. Osborn?”

 

“There’s not a single listening device in this building that I didn’t plant myself,” Norman says. “The ones in this room have been deactivated.”

 

He could tell from the director’s expression that he didn’t quite buy that last bit, but apparently, he didn’t have time to argue the point, so he just nodded.

 

“The reason for this subterfuge is that we believe we have a large-scale security breach at SHIELD,” he said. “Quite frankly, I’m not sure who to trust anymore. I met agents Coulson and Danvers well before they were SHIELD members, and I can confirm that they are not Hydra sympathizers.”

 

“Hydra?” Ben Grimm asked. “Think I’ve hearda them. They’re the Nazis that are crazy, even for Nazis.”

 

“Essentially, yes,” Director Rogers said with a small shrug. “Hydra began as a splinter group of the Nazi party, a group that believed in the advancement of science, and by extension the human race, at any cost.  They went through a lot of leadership changes in the early days, but the one that really stuck was a man by the name Johann Schmidt, alias the Red Skull.”

 

“This guy was what really turned Hydra from a bunch of crazy scientists to a bunch of crazy scientists with a lot of manpower and a true goal,” Nick Fury piped in from near the door. “The Red Skull believed that natural selection had done its part in advancing mankind, and it was time for us to take charge of our own evolution.”

 

“In fact, before joining up with Hydra, Johann Schmidt briefly worked with Dr. Abraham Erskine in the early days of Project: Rebirth,” Rogers continued. “They eventually parted ways, and from what I’m told, it was not a polite parting. Schmidt stole copies of Erskine’s research and continued the project on his own, using himself as his first and only test subject. The transformation was not a pretty one; it left him physically deformed and psychologically…unhinged. As far as we know, he ended up destroying his research afterward, and he hasn’t attempted it again since. He likely doesn’t want to risk creating someone that has a chance of knocking him out of his position.”

 

“Well…didn’t he die?” Sue asked, leaning back in her seat with a puzzled expression. “I mean, there was a whole unit about him when I was in school, and they told us he died when his bunker collapsed in Berlin or something.”

 

“That’s what the world thought for a long time,” Nick said. “But we have reason to believe that he’s not as dead as we’d hoped. There have been rumors out of a small Eastern European town, Latveria. A new monarch has established himself and is rallying the people to ‘follow him into the future’. That’s all well and progressive, but a disturbing number of disappearances have also been reported, both in the nation itself and in neighboring countries. Some of our agents in the area have overheard some very telling conversations between the locals.”

 

“You think the Red Skull somehow survived fifty years in a frozen bunker?” Tony asked. “That’s a long time to spend on ice, and not even like a clean, controlled freeze, like Austin Powers or that kid in the Avatar. This is just a cave with some scraps.”

 

“We have no way of knowing just what affects the serum had on the Red Skull,” the director replied. “It’s highly probable and, according to many of our own scientists, very likely that the sheer cold of the bunker caused him to enter a suspended animation where a normal man would have just frozen to death. How he came to leave the bunker, we’re not sure, but evidence here at home points to a sudden and methodical increase in Hydra activity. They’re attempting to infiltrate SHIELD, and they’re succeeding.”

 

“Several of our agents were revealed to by Hydra operatives, including the one we originally had stationed at Oscorp before Agent Danvers,” Nick said. “Thanks to that little oversight, they not only got a hold of Dr. Curt Connors’s _very_ ill-advised attempts at limb regrowth research and weaponized it into an army of lizard soldiers, they also ended up releasing a small army of mutated spiders, and we all know how _that_ turned out.”

 

“Quite well, in my personal opinion,” Tony said. “Except for one or two hiccups.”

 

Norman felt a small growl forming in his throat. Hydra, infiltrating _his_ business? Curt’s work was in the hands of those men, being used to transform the already sociopathic scum of society into even more depraved monsters? Curt was already ashamed of the catastrophic results of his efforts at regrowing his lost limb, even if his heart was in the right place. To know that his research was being used to its most monstrous end on a mass scale….

 

“In any case,” the director continued, “that’s on us, and we apologize. But that just tells you firsthand how dangerous these men are. They hide behind notions of scientific advancement and betterment of mankind, but they’re terrorists, and they’ll step on anyone that doesn’t march to the beat of their drum.”

 

“So, what’s the plan?” Sue asked. “How are we supposed to help?”

 

“The plan is the Avengers Intiative,” Nick replied, standing and making his way to stand next to the director. “SHIELD is compromised; the United States government is compromised. We need outside help, and that’s you. All of you have talents that will be very useful in aiding our cause, and all of you have proven in the past that you can handle yourself in a fight. The plan is to root out Hydra at the source, to gather what we can on their operatives back here, and eliminate them.”

 

“That sounds simple enough when you say it,” Norman said. “But none of us are exactly well-suited for espionage.”

 

“Danvers maybe,” Tony said. “She had us fooled.”

 

“Agent Danvers is going to be fighting right alongside the rest of you,” Rogers said. “You’ve had quite an effect on her, in fact. She would like to remain at Oscorp and continue to work with Stark. But we can discuss that later.”

 

“Or never,” Tony cut in before the director held his hand up.

 

“We’re getting off-topic,” he said. “You will be provided with a few agents, all of whom have worked with Nick or myself before their time in SHIELD. We can personally vouch for every one of them. Nick and myself will not be able to get involved any more than this meeting; we’re simply being watched too closely.”

 

“Sir,” Nick said from behind him, having stepped away to answer his phone, “she’s at the lobby.”

 

“ _Mister Osborn, there’s a Natalia Romanova here to see Director Rogers_ ,” Jarvis said. Norman glanced at the director, who just nodded.

 

“Show her up,” Norman said with a curious expression. “Rogers?”

 

“Natalia is a personal friend of mine,” he said with a small smile. “Some time back, I met her while on a mission in Europe, and since then, we’ve kept in touch. I contacted her recently and offered her a position on the Avengers. She seemed quite eager to join up.”

 

The door opened once more, revealing the sort of woman that got Tony into a lot of trouble. She was average of height and slim but athletic looking, with the bearing of gymnast or a ballet dancer. Her bright blue eyes, almost too big for her face, took the room in with open curiosity, landing on Tony and the empty seat next to him. Tucking a lock of dark red hair behind her ear, she made her way over to sit next to him. She wore tight-fitting black pants that looked like leather and an equally form-fitting black sleeveless shirt that left little to the imagination, though she looked the sort not to suffer the imaginative type. The most striking feature, though, was the hammer slung to her side. Norman had never seen such a weapon outside of an enthusiast’s collection or a museum, but the way her hand kept brushing the handle, as though reassuring herself that it was still there, she used it frequently. It was a simple war hammer, with a short handle meant to be wielded with one hand and a solid rectangular head with beveled edges and some sort of insignia on the broader sides.

 

“Gentlemen, Ms. Storm,” Rogers said, “this is Natalia Romanova, acting goddess of thunder.”

 

……

 

 I’m having tea with Charles Xavier.

 

This is sort of one of the best days of my life.

 

Even Flash Thompson is apparently cowed by the professor, who’s gained a reputation similar to Albus Dumbledore of Harry Potter, the enigmatic leader of a school of those differently-talented than the average person while also being something of a badass himself.

 

The English accent certainly helps the resemblance.

 

With our masks folded carefully away from our mouths, Gwen and I sip at our tea, listening to Flash and the professor tell us about the X-Mansion, its mission to help the lost and confused mutants of the world find a place to learn about and control their powers, and their constant struggle to gain acceptance, which puts them at odds with the Brotherhood, a similar but more radical group of mutants run by a man calling himself Magneto.

 

“They believe themselves above humans,” the professor tells us. “While we only seek for peaceful coexistence, Magneto would have mutants rise up and subjugate the rest of mankind. Sadly, circumstances do call for…conflict from time to time.”

 

“But the good guys always win, right?” Flash asks, grinning into his teacup as he takes a drink.

 

“The good guys always do their best,” I say, taking a drink from my own cup. “We don’t always win the day, but we can’t stop trying.”

 

“Well said,” the professor says with an approving smile at me. “Sometimes the sweetest victory is knowing you’ll be able to try again. And if you can’t, knowing you’re leaving behind a world that has a great shot.”

 

“Is that what this is all about?” I say, gesturing in a general outward direction at the school around us. “Making sure mutants have a place to come back to and regroup before giving it another try?”

 

“That’s a very poetic way of looking at what we’re doing here,” the professor says, nodding before giving a small sigh. “Sadly, the reality isn’t as idealistic. Frankly, the world is moving in a direction that doesn’t necessarily agree with the presence of mutants. You’ve seen how they react to you and your friends. While the youth see you as a novelty, even inspiring, the sad truth is that the future is _not_ now. The world remains in control of those with outdated and bigoted views, those who look at things that are new and different and well outside their control, their understanding of the world, and react with fear and hatred. The sad truth is that my school is simply a shelter for mutants to ride out the storm, to have a place to stay until those with a more open and accepting understanding of the world are those that actually have a say in how the world works.”

 

“It’s not fair that that’s what it’s come to,” Gwen says. “People wanna talk about change and progressiveness, but if you want change, you have to go through about fourteen different legal processes to get any kind of change accepted, and if some bureaucrat in the pocket of seven different business doesn’t agree with that change, sorry, you’re screwed.”

 

“And that’s why you guys just swing around and do your vigilante stuff like you do, right?” Flash asks, grinning.

 

“Sort of,” I say with a shrug. “I do it because it’s the right thing to do and because I…well, I owe it to someone.”

 

“I do it because I believe in what he’s doing,” Gwen says, smiling over at me as she lifts her teacup and takes a small sip. “And…well, I think I owe it to someone, too.”

 

“Remarkable,” Xavier says. “A young man that inspires such goodness in so many people. Flash here hasn’t stopped singing your praises, and you’ve of course heard of the impression you’ve left on Miss Pryde. I have to send out my X-Men to recruit others to my cause, but…your allies, they seem to just find you.”

 

“I mean, they really do,” Gwen says with a small shrug. “You really could start your own team or some – the Neighborhood Watch!”

 

I chuckle, placing a hand to my forehead. “It’s a beautiful day in the neighborhood,” I say, shaking my head. Flash looks confused for a moment, but he just shrugs and sips at his tea.

 

“And what would you do with said team?” Professor Xavier asks. “Fight crime, beat up purse-snatchers? The usual?”

 

His tone isn’t snide or accusatory; he’s genuinely curious, and I get the feeling this is some kind of test.

 

“I…I don’t know,” I say with a shrug. “We can go around beating up bad guys all day, but….”

 

“But?” he prods.

 

“It just feels like…maybe we should be doing something…more,” I say. “Or at least, widen our scope. We can beat up petty criminals as much as we want, but…there’ll always be more. And meanwhile, that Daredevil guy is taking on the actual mob, like…bigtime guys. We’re powerful. We shouldn’t be taking on supervillains and stuff just because we fall into their plans.”

 

“Well, don’t sell yourself short,” Gwen says, smiling over at me. “You have the police scanners and your crime-tracker apps and stuff. You do your best.”

 

“Yeah, but…I dunno, with all this talk about the future and people with bigoted views in control…. I mean, people like Wilson Fisk, who are so obviously connected to all kinds of horrible stuff,” I say. “The Maggia families. These guys are allowed to walk around because they have so much money and are paying off people in powerful positions and throwing their dirty money at charities for some good PR. You try to call either of them out, you get yourself in trouble.”

 

“Well, you have a mask,” Flash says. “Go web ‘em up.”

 

I nod, humming thoughtfully.

 

“Maybe it _is_ time to take it things up a notch.”

 

……

 

We say our farewells to the X-Men, wishing Flash well and heading back along the arduous path to the Blackbird. Jean Gray and Kitty Pryde fly us back to New York, telling us that we’re always welcome at the X-Mansion before flying away. With that, we’re left in the same park we were picked up in, Gwen sighing hugely.

 

“That was fun, but I’m also ready to get out of this costume,” she says as three police cruisers go roaring by, sirens sounding and lights flashing. “Of course.”

 

“Spider-phone, local breaking news,” I say as we hurry to climb up the nearest building. In front of my eyes, my HUD blinks and shows an arrow pointing ahead and slightly to the left, small words appearing in the corner of my vision. “Shootout, looks like a meth lab. Damn, they’re pulling officers from all over the city, must be a big one.”

 

“I’m pretty sure this wasn’t what they had in mind when they made Breaking Bad,” Gwen says as we head for the edge of the rooftop to take off.

 

“You make Finding Nemo, you get a lot of people buying clownfish,” I say. “You make a show about a badass meth dealer, you get meth labs. Is that such a stretch?”

 

We jump and start webbing our way toward the lab, which has apparently sprung up in an old condemned office building in Harlem. From what I can see, over a dozen cars are already at the scene, and more are converging. Police barricades have already sprung up, and two choppers are buzzing overhead as we get closer.

 

This is a doozy.

 

We arrive to a scene of mayhem, with the cops barely holding the line against dozens of armed, strung-out psychos. The ones in the upper windows are preventing the police from approaching without risking a shot, and SWAT hasn’t arrived on the scene yet, so there’s no way to storm the building.

 

Well, not for your average cop. For someone with web-shooters and crazy spider-enhanced strength and reflexes, it’s laughably simple to go crashing through a window as a meth-head shoots wildly at me, pinging my spider-sense, but I’m moving too fast for him to get a hit. I collide with his lanky frame, sending him crashing to the floor, where he stays.

 

“Good call,” I tell him as a pale, drawn woman wheels on me with a wild-eyed look. She grabs a baseball bat from its spot leaning against the wall and tears toward me.

 

“This is just sad,” I say, easily dodging the hit and snagging the bat from her hands.

 

_Zzzt-SHAF!_

 

With a quick tap of my taser fingers, she’s sent to the floor, twitching feebly and groaning. Gwen leaps into the building after me and hurries over.

 

“I…Pete, my dad’s out there,” she says softly, and I turn to her. She’s bouncing nervously on her feet, and I can almost feel the tension through whatever weird spider-sense link we have. “We have to – “

 

“End this quick,” I say, taking her hand. “C’mon, let’s save the cops some trouble.”

 

After fighting the Superior Six or Harry’s Venom-addled self, taking out a building full of tweaked out meth-heads, half of whom are armed only with improvised weapons or nothing at all, is embarrassingly simple. There are a few moments where things get hairy, like trying to dodge two wildly shooting guys who have to be the dealers, because they seem to have most of their faculties, but Gwen’s ability to move faster than even _I_ can track sometimes means even they don’t take long to subdue. Other than that, there’s a lot of dodging wild swings or ducking under raised pistols to crack someone across the jaw.

 

Within ten minutes, the whole building looks like some kind of modern interpretation of that giant spider’s lair from the Two Towers. Or was it Return of the King?

 

In any case, there are no less than two dozen men and women webbed to the walls and ceilings, either unconscious or _very_ upset with us by the time SWAT arrives, barging through the ground floor loud enough that we hear from two floors above. We glance at each other, Gwen already heading for a window.

 

“Time to go,” she says, but my spider-sense clangs loudly as she starts to climb out, and I hurry forward.

 

“Hold it – “

 

_Pop!_

 

“AGH! Fuck! Fuck, ow, fuck, fuck, fuck!” I stagger back as a bullet tears through my right shoulder, and Gwen screams.

 

“Peter!” she screeches. “Oh my God, oh shit, hold on!” She yells out the window. “HOLD YOUR FIRE! Damn it, Peter, I would’ve dodged it!”

 

“Reflex action,” I grunt. “I have a hero complex, sue me.”

 

_THAWP!_

 

She tightens a string of her webbing around the wound, and I almost black out at the wave of pain it sends along my arm.

 

“Ah, damn it!” I grunt, and she whines fretfully.

 

“Alright, we have to get you out of here and somewhere we can call Tony,” she says.

 

“Am I late to the party?” another voice says, and we look to see Johnny standing in the doorway with his wingsuit still on, having probably just flown in through a window on the backside of the building. He pauses at the sight that greets him. “Holy shit, what happened?”

 

“Some trigger-happy officer shot him!” Gwen says heatedly. “Dusk, can you make like a flat surface like a stretcher with your shields?”

 

“Uh, yeah, yeah, definitely,” he says, holding his hands out.

 

“Alright, make one for him to lie on, and we’re gonna get out of here,” she says.

 

“But the SWAT team’s clearing out the building like _right now_ ,” Johnny says while Gwen gently guides me to the stretcher.

 

“Gwen, I can walk – “

 

“Peter _Benjamin_ Parker – “

 

“Alright, alr – ow, damn it,” I grunt as my arm shifts painfully. I lie on my back on a translucent purple-blue barrier, blinking when I see red splotches all over the floor. I look down to see more red pooling under my shoulder on the barrier.

 

That’s not promising.

 

“Alright, we’re moving,” Johnny says. “Hang in there, Pete.”

 

Gwen hurries ahead and opens the door to see a startled SWAT team.

 

“Hands in the – “

 

_THAWP-THAWP-THAWP-THAWP!_

 

“Let’s _go_!” Gwen says, storming down the hallway, past the webbed-up forms of the SWAT team, who have been judiciously subdued and stuck to the wall.

 

“Freeze!” a voice yells, but Gwen doesn’t even slow down. “You have one ch – open fire!”

 

The officers fire, but the bullets bounce ineffectually off of another translucent blue barrier, which Johnny propels outward with enough force to stagger the officers long enough for Gwen to rush in and knock them out with a ferocity I’ve never seen before, stringing them all up from the ceiling with a strangled shout of frustration. She leads us to a stairwell, pausing.

 

“How you holding up?” she asks, looking back at me, and I give her a small thumbs-up.

 

“You look so hot right now,” I tell her, and she just scoffs.

 

“I know,” she says, hurrying down the stairs and stopping in the main hallway when a voice booms out.

 

“ _Spider-Man and Black Widow_.”

 

“Dad,” Gwen whispers.

 

“ _If you are injured, come out slowly, and we will arrange for medical attention._ ”

 

“Oh, Dad, there are about two million reasons that can’t happen,” Gwen grumbles, looking back at us. “Dusk, give us a sturdy, tight barrier, and keep him level, alright?”

 

“Got it,” Johnny says, his voice stony and serious. Gwen steps forward and kicks the door open with enough force to knock it off its hinges.

 

“ _An ambulance is on the way_ ,” George Stacy says into a megaphone, his stern visage glaring at us from a sea of anxious faces and raised guns. “ _Stand down and remove your masks_.”

 

“What’s the play, Widow?” Dusk asks.

 

“Spidey?” she asks. “Okay?”

 

“Chilly, but alright,” I say, trying to inject some strength into my voice, but I’m sure Gwen hears how weak it’s getting.

 

“Oh my gosh,” she says, taking a deep breath and yelling out at the cops. “We’re leaving! _We’re_ getting him help!”

 

“ _Don’t be foolish, Widow_!”

 

“My dad didn’t raise a fool!” Gwen yells back, and there’s a short silence in which I see Captain Stacy’s expression twist.

 

“ _Take the mask off_ ,” he says firmly into the megaphone. “ _Stand. Down_.”

 

“Make me,” Gwen says. “Dusk.”

 

“Following,” Johnny says, and the two of them go tearing down the street while I zoom along beside them on my makeshift stretcher. A few gunshots sound, but they bounce off of a barrier from Johnny.

 

“Hold your fire!” I hear Captain Stacy yell.

 

That’s gonna be a problem later.

 

“Okay,” Gwen says as we run, rounding a corner and taking us into a large parking lot in front of a rec center or something. It’s deserted, probably thanks to the police barricade. “I sent out a distress beacon, so – “

 

She cuts off as a rushing sound suddenly fills the air, and as I’m fighting to stay conscious, I see a familiar helicopter swoop overhead, seeming to materialize from nowhere.

 

Tony finally worked out the bugs on those retro-reflective panels, I see.

 

“Thank God,” Gwen sighs. “Pete, you with me?”

 

“Feeling a bit cold,” I say, and she leans down, her face swimming above me wearing a concerned expression.

 

“I need you to focus, okay?” she asks. “C’mon, stay here, keep talking.”

 

“ _What happened_?” a voice asks. It’s Carol, wearing her Iron Marvel armor. “ _Oh, hell. I need a medical unit! Gunshot wound to the shoulder_!”

 

I’m surrounded by Chameleon bots as Johnny carries me into the chopper and settles me onto a steel table, and with a small pinching that I barely feel in my shoulder, the pain starts to ebb and fade away, replaced by cool numbness. I sigh in relief, letting out a breath.

 

“That’s so much better,” I say.

 

“How did you get shot?” Carol asks, her faceplate folded away. The hatch on the chopper shuts, muting the sounds of the repulsor engines humming to life, and I feel myself get slightly heavier as we lift off.

 

“The bonehead jumped in front of me to take a bullet,” Gwen grumbles, pulling her mask away to reveal tears in her eyes, which are puffy and red. “Dumbass.”

 

“Love you, too,” I say, and Johnny pulls my mask off as well. “Thanks for the save, Johnny.”

 

“Saw the news, and I had to help out my new best buds,” he says. “Glad I got there when I did.”

 

“Yeah, you probably saved his life,” Gwen says, sighing and slumping into a seat. “Is he gonna be alright?”

 

“He’s already healing, actually,” Carol says, shaking her head. “Heck, he’ll be able to move around again by the time we get back to HQ, and by tomorrow, it should be a scar.”

 

“Yay for being a freak,” I say with a voice that’s still a bit weak, lifting my good arm in celebration. Gwen just rolls her eyes, reaching out and brushing some stray hairs from my forehead.

 

“Please don’t ever do anything like that ever again?” she asks softly, and I smile over at her.

 

“No promises,” I tell her, and she just huffs.

 

“I would have dodged – “

 

“Would you take a bullet for me?” I ask, and she blinks but nods.

 

“Yeah, duh, without even like thinking about it,” she says.

 

“And if I saw you do that and started worrying over you, you would tell me…?”

 

“Worth it,” she mumbles. “Shut up.”

 

“Love you,” I tell her, and she shakes her head with a wry little smile.

 

“Love you too.”

 

……

 

Of course she wasn’t home. She was never home when he got there. She usually claimed to have been over at Parker’s house or out with him on a date. The two were madly in love; even George could tell, despite not seeing his daughter as often as he wished he could.

 

“It’s fine, Daddy,” she would say. “I know you’re just trying to keep the city safe.”

 

He’d been so proud of her when she said that; she understood that he was only doing everything he could to make New York a better place, to make the world a better place.

 

For her.

 

But she apparently had her own ideas on how to accomplish such a goal, and she was acting on them with reckless abandon.

 

 _You don’t know that_ , he told himself. _Black Widow could be anyone._

 

But she sure did sound a lot like his daughter. The line of, “My father didn’t raise a fool.”

 

He used to tell her that all the time when she was being stubborn as a child.

 

_“Gwen, you’re being ridiculous.”_

_“Gwen, this is quite enough.”_

_“I didn’t raise a fool, did I?”_

 

As she got older, it was something they would throw back and forth. When Gwen forgot to do her homework or scored badly on a test.

 

_“Gwen, I didn’t raise a fool, did I?”_

 

Conversely, if she did well, as she was much more likely to do, bringing home perfect scores and glowing commendations on her report cards, she would parrot the words right back at him.

 

_“Of course. George Stacy didn’t raise a fool.”_

 

George sighed, settling onto the sofa with a beer. He didn’t even turn on the television, staring at the blank screen, his own dour expression glaring back at him in the reflection.

 

He could raid her room, check for evidence of her alleged vigilantism. He could take his concerns over to May Parker. If that wasn’t Peter wearing that blue costume alongside her, he was surely helping out somehow. But no, May had suffered enough. There was no sense worrying her over circumstantial evidence at best and paranoia at worse.

 

It felt ridiculous to be entertaining this notion, but the more he thought about it, the more it seemed to fit with Gwen’s distance lately, the inordinate amount of time she spent with Peter Parker. George knew they were dating, knew that Gwen was crazy about the boy. He didn’t want to fall into the trap of the overly-controlling father that forbade his daughter from spending so much time alone with a boy only to find out that he’s only been forcing them together. How could he, when he and her mother had dated under very similar circumstances back in high school? The flash of rage he felt imagining Gwen and Peter Parker getting up to the sorts of things he did with Helen was almost immediately quenched by how happy they’d both been, how right it had felt.

 

But now, knowing that the two were pursuing some delusion of grandeur, swinging around the city fighting crime and putting themselves in danger like this? Not only was it George’s responsibility as a parent to ensure his daughter stayed safe, it was his duty as a police Captain to stop this blatant flouting of the justice system.

 

The problem with that was telling Gwen that she was going to have to stop doing something that she was obviously passionate about. George could already see the defiant pout, the fire burning in her eyes.

 

She was so like Helen.

 

The door opened, and George braced himself. As he heard it shut, and Gwen made her way through the entryway, glancing over at him and stopping when she saw him. She stepped into the archway and leaned against the wood frame.

 

“I didn’t think you’d be home until later tonight,” she said.

 

“The commissioner let me head out early after all the time I put in earlier this week, with that missing persons case,” he said.

 

“Not going out for drinks with DeWolff?” she asked, and George shook his head.

 

“She’s on a case right now,” he said. “No, I thought I’d come straight home, see how my daughter’s spending her Saturday. Out with Peter again?”

 

“Yep,” she says with a little smile. “Went to the mall. Window-shopping mostly, since we’re broke. He wasn’t feeling well, though, so we left early.”

 

“How’s his shoulder?” George asked in a quiet voice, watching her reaction.

 

The color drained from her face, her eyes shooting wide for half a second before she did her best to control her expression. She was good, but you didn’t become a police Captain and the father of a fifteen-year-old girl and not learn to see through masks.

 

“His…shoulder is fine,” she said, trying for confusion, but her voice shook slightly as she spoke. “What does being sick have to do with a shoulder?”

 

“Gwen,” George said, standing. “Did I raise a fool?”

 

She blinked at that, and though she _was_ a good actress, George caught the hints, the small shifts in her stance, the way her face paled and then flushed, her eyes darting around before meeting his.

 

She had his eyes. His nose. His cheekbones. So much about her was like him, but there was enough of Helen that it was almost like she was the physical embodiment of their love, evidence that yes, at one time, George Stacy was truly happy.

 

She was also an infuriating blend of their personalities, with a double-dose of stubborn, one from each of them, evidenced in the way her face set into a frown at his glare. When Gwen knew she’d done something wrong, George had no trouble laying down the law, and Gwen was usually pretty quick to back down.

 

No, it was when she knew she’d done something _right_ and was in trouble for it that the trademark Stacy stubbornness surfaced with a vengeance.

 

“No, Dad, you didn’t raise a fool,” she said. “You raised a girl that cares a lot about her friends and especially her best friend and boyfriend. And I should actually head back and see if he’s okay.”

 

“Oh, I’m sure May is taking good care of him,” George said, folding his arms. “Why don’t you stick around? I think we need to have a talk.”

 

“Dad,” she said, that frown deepening. “It’s been a busy day for both of us.”

 

“I thought you just went to the mall,” George said wryly, quirking an eyebrow. Her brow furrowed, and her shoulders set, a pose her mother often took when they went sass for sass.

 

“I did, and it was a busy day there,” she says, obviously trying to quell the heat in her tone. “I’m kinda ready to just relax.”

 

“With Peter?” George asked. “That didn’t look relaxing to me.”

 

“ _What_ didn’t?” Gwen asked, glaring up at him. “Are we doing this? Are we having this discussion?”

 

“You got yourself into this when you yelled _our line_ at me in the middle of a police standoff, Black Widow!” George said.

 

She froze at that, taking a deep breath. “Dad,” she said. “I….”

 

“Gwen, what on Earth are you thinking?” George asked “How did this even happen? Who else knows about this?”

 

She let out the breath and moved over to slump onto the couch, elbows on her knees, face in her hands. “Dad, this is…I didn’t want you to find out like this,” she said. “I didn’t want you find out _at all_. You have enough to worry about as Captain, I – “

 

“Gwen, I don’t know if you understand how fatherhood works, but the daughter is the number one priority here,” he said. “There’s never ‘enough’ to worry about that I won’t worry about you, too.”

 

“That’s just what I mean,” Gwen said. “You don’t _have_ to worry about me, I promise.”

 

“You are out there fighting the worst scum of New York, risking your life _and_ interfering with my job on more than one occasion, and I’m not supposed to worry about you?” George asked. “Gwen, this is _dangerous_ , and even accounting for good Samaritan laws, jumping into the middle of a police standoff and taking matters into your own hands and then evading arrest _and_ assaulting _twelve_ SWAT members? And that’s just _today_!”

 

“Dad, think about what you just said, though,” Gwen says. “Twelve SWAT members. I have powers, I can do things most people could never dream of. Why shouldn’t I use that? Why shouldn’t I do whatever I can to make the world even slightly better?”

 

“Because you’re only fifteen!” George found himself shouting at her. He clenched his hands, taking a deep breath and letting it out. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to yell, I just – “

 

He was cut off by a knock on the door, and he recognized the “shave and a haircut pattern” followed by the ringing of the doorbell as the final two tones. Gwen turned toward the door with evident confusion as well, so she clearly wasn’t expecting anyone. Moving past her, George made for the door and opened it to see Peter standing there, next to a man about George’s own age, maybe a bit younger. He was tall, with inky black hair parted and styled flawlessly and a neatly trimmed beard and mustache. He wore simple black jeans and a dark blue Beatles shirt under an open jacket.

 

“Tony Stark,” George said, recognizing him from a recent cover of People magazine. “What—Peter, what’s going on?”

 

“Your daughter’s boyfriend told me that you’ve found yourself in the loop,” Tony said, “and he seems to think you’d do well with some grown-up input on the situation. Smart guy. You can listen to kids talk about how they’re handling things all day, but c’mon, they’re just kids, right? Mind if we come in?”

 

“Um…we’re having a family discussion – “

 

“Listen,” Tony overrode him. “I won’t sit here and pretend I know how you feel. I don’t have kids, and my dad wasn’t exactly a model father when he was alive. But I do know what it’s like to worry about someone. And I’d like to do what I can to put those fears to rest.”

 

George started at him for a moment, stepping back and letting him in.

 

“Wonderful,” he said, stepping inside with Peter in tow. “First of all, I couldn’t help but hear you shouting? Your voice carries quite amazingly, you should consider a career in opera or something. In any case, you’re right. Gwen is only fifteen. Whole life ahead of her, still has the blissful naiveté of youth, it’s…sort of sweet. But, and I tell you this with the utmost honesty…I hate kids. They’re…immature, self-absorbed, overly dramatic, and…unpleasantly sticky hands.” He wiggled his fingers then gestured to Peter. “Pete, here? Your daughter? They’re not kids. They are, and I can’t believe I’m saying this, wise beyond their years. They’re young adults. They’re still young, but that means, now more than ever, they need _guidance_ while they figure out what they’re supposed to be doing.”

 

“But this?” George asked him, folding his arms. “Running around in costumes and beating up punks?”

 

“Maybe she’s just trying to follow in her old man’s footsteps,” Tony said, shrugging. “In a…less than orthodox way, but still.”

 

“It’s not due process,” George said with a shake of his head. “You gather evidence, you make a case, you get a warrant – “

 

“And the entire time, Wilson Fisk or the Maggia families continue making the world worse until they get arrested and pay off the right people,” Peter interrupted him suddenly. “Then they go right back to what they were doing.”

 

“Dad, last week, a prostitution ring was broken up, and you guys arrested _twelve_ of Silvio Manfredi’s men,” Gwen said. “They all swore up and down that they had nothing to do with Manfredi, and he’s still out there, making New York City worse. Doesn’t that…I mean, aren’t you at least a little upset about that?”

 

“And what would you do?” George asked. “Find Manfredi and ask him to stop?”

 

“Find out everything we can about all of his operations and take them out,” Peter replied flatly. “Spider-Man doesn’t need a warrant.”

 

“That’s not the way the law works,” George said.

 

“Then the _law_ is – “

 

“Woah, calm down there, kid,” Tony said, patting his shoulder before glancing up at George. “Passionate, isn’t he? I think the point he’s trying to make is there’s a time for due process and there’s a time for taking care of someone who’s skating around the law and using it against you. Look, you’re a good guy. You’re Lawful Good, and you’re trying to come to terms with the fact that your daughter is choosing Chaotic Good.”

 

“Is that a D&D reference?” Peter asked, momentarily distracted.

 

“I dabbled, not important right now,” Tony said, turning back to George. “I understand, though, you’re a cop. You hate wildcards. But if that wildcard is you’re daughter, who just wants to do right by you, isn’t that better than that guy Daredevil or the Punisher? You can sit here and fight her, and she’ll probably…run away, right? Find someplace to hunker down and fight crime in secret?”

 

“Absolutely,” Gwen nodded without hesitation.

 

“Or you can take this opportunity to be an important figure in your daughter’s life and help shape her future,” Tony said. “And in the process, clear some of the rot out of the Big Apple.”

 

“Why are you such an altruist all of a sudden?” George asked, and Tony just smirked, clapping Peter on the shoulder.

 

“This kid is such a goody two-shoes, it’s contagious,” he said. “Look…why don’t we talk more? Have you eaten? Steak? I know a place, makes an amazing ribeye and has this house cocktail called the Steer’s Lament. A little theatrical, but it goes down well with their signature sauce. On me.”

 

He was already leading George for the door, but he stopped in the entryway, looking back at Gwen, who smiled at him.

 

“We’ve had a long day anyway,” she said, turning to Pete. “This one’s already grounded until his shoulder feels better.”

 

“Officer Carter has already been ordered to do a remedial gun safety course,” George told him, and Peter let a small chuckle.

 

“I’ll forgive him this once,” he says.

 

“Dad,” Gwen said, and George glanced at her as he was putting on his jacket. “I…I love you, Dad.”

 

George smiled at her, moving over and pulling her into a hug. “I love you, too, sweetheart,” he said, kissing the top of her head. “And no matter how upset I might get, I’m…so proud that you’re passionate about doing the right thing.”

 

She beamed up at him as he pulled away, heading back for the door and following Tony to his expensive-looking Lamborghini.

 

“Aren’t you worried about that getting stolen?” he asked as they stepped down onto the path to the driveway.

 

“This car has one of the most sophisticated anti-theft systems in the world,” Tony says. “It’s more secure than Ravencroft.”

 

“Given the number of escapes they’ve had, I wouldn’t brag about that,” George said, climbing into the passenger seat.

 

“Touché.”


	3. Chapter 3

“A staycation?”

 

“Just a one-day thing where we don’t go out and do crazy spider-stuff, saving the world,” Gwen says as we sit at her kitchen table, chowing down on some bacon and eggs. “Dad does it sometimes, just puts the badge away and lets himself be George Stacy without being a police Captain. If we keep running around to save the city every time the police scanner goes off, we’re gonna wind up with ulcers or receding hairlines or something.”

 

I reach up and run my fingers through my shaggy locks. “Not my hair.”

 

“It’s such pretty hair, you can’t have it falling out,” Gwen agrees, reaching up to tug playfully at it.

 

I chuckle, and she leans over to kiss me softly.

 

“Alright,” I say. “One day. But can we do at-home spider-stuff? Like…Tony just sent me MJ’s Jackpot armor, and I’d really like to at least have her try it on before we go testing it out.”

 

She rolls her eyes but nods. “Alright, but only because you look so cute when you nerd out like that.”

 

“Noooo, guys aren’t supposed to be cute,” I protest, frowning at her. “We’re super cool and macho.”

 

“Peter Parker, you may be a lot of things, but you are so not macho,” Gwen says with a little snicker. “If you were macho, I wouldn’t be dating you.”

 

“Oh,” I say, taking a bite of my bacon. “Well, remind me never to take advice from Randy Savage.”  


“Pete, Randy Savage has been dead for like…ten years,” Gwen says.

 

“Whaaaaat?” I ask. “No, but how will people know how to be macho?”

 

“I guess they’ll just have to learn from the legacy he left behind,” Gwen says with a little smile, shrugging.

 

“That’s sad, though,” I say, leaning back in my seat and finishing my bacon. “He needs to live forever.”

 

“C’mon, you doof,” she says, standing up and taking her plate, stacking it on mine and carrying them to the sink. “If we head out now, we can catch the bus.”

 

“The bus?” I ask, canting my head to the side. “We can just web to school.”

 

“Yes, but I can’t make out with you for like twenty minutes while we web-swing,” Gwen says, giving me a pointed look as she rinses the dishes and stuffs them in the dishwasher. “It’s Monday, why not start the week out on a high note?”

 

“Sometimes you say things that are just so…smart,” I say. “Like…you need to go do really important science things right now.”

 

She giggles, making her way back over to pull me to my feet, planting a soft little kiss on my jaw. “But then who would keep making you do _your_ important science things?”

 

“Oh…fuck, that’s quite a conundrum,” I admit as we gather up our backpacks and head for the door. “I am stumped. You have stumped me, Gwen Stacy.”

 

She smirks and hugs onto me as we walk outside into the unseasonably warm Spring morning. “That’s what a good girlfriend does.”

 

……

 

It’s surreal to step off the bus and make our way toward Midtown High like any other normal students. We spent last Saturday visiting the X-Men, and the following Sunday was spent in my basement while I rested up after a gunshot wound and dabbled into possibly conceiving an AI at Johnny’s insistence.

 

“All the best scientists have an AI assistant that they designed!” he said insistently.

 

And now, here we are, two teenagers showing up for a totally mundane day of school. Thankfully, Gwen is a taskmaster and made sure we were all caught up on homework, even if it meant staying up until midnight hastily writing an English essay.

 

It’s at least B-grade work, I’d say.

 

Despite that, I can’t help but feel like I’m waking up from a particularly vivid dream as I mount the steps into yet another day of classes. Do any of my fellow students realize that just the other day I was doing my small part in making their lives just a little better?

 

Actually, I hope not.

 

We join the tide of students making their way toward the doors, and as we walk, I get the faintest little buzz from my spider-sense before someone flumps into me from behind, letting a whiny yawning sound.

 

“Gaaah, I slept like hell last night,” Mary Jane says into my back. “I want my Jackpot armor alreadyyyyy.”

 

“MJ, not so loud,” I say, and she sort of slides along to walk next to me, rolling her eyes. “I know no one hardly pays attention to us, but I’d rather not take any chances.”

 

“Actually, the ball of charisma that does the announcements every other day and his ever-growing harem of ladies?” Johnny’s voice says as he joins us. “People pay attention, even if it’s a little.”

 

“Did you just refer to us as his harem?” Gwen asks with a bemused look.

 

“Every guy secretly wants a harem,” Johnny says with a little shrug. “Right, Pete?”

 

“No comment,” I say instantly. “None, ever, plead the fifth.”

 

Mary Jane just snickers, shaking her head and rolling her eyes. “Harem or not, you kind of _are_ a ball of charisma. Like three girls on the track team have kinda asked me real subtle-like if you’re single, and I have to tell them no, you’re with Gwen Stacy.”

 

Gwen smirks, wrapping her arms possessively around me. “Mine,” she says, and I chuckle.

 

“I’m just in-demand, I guess,” I say, shrugging as Gwen nuzzles into my cheek and kisses it.

 

“Don’t let it go to your head,” she whispers in my ear.

 

We head inside, and Johnny breaks off from us to head for the Junior hall lockers, leaving me with Gwen and MJ.

 

“Oh, MJ, speaking _of_ your armor, though,” I say, glancing around to make sure no one’s nearby, “you should come by my place after school. I might have a surprise for you.”

 

MJ gasps. “No way, it’s here!?” she says, bouncing on her feet. “Is it super awesome looking?”

 

“I haven’t looked at it yet,” I say, stopping at Gwen’s locker while she grabs out some books. “I thought you should be the first.”

 

“Ah!” she squeaks, jumping and hugging me tightly, her hair swiping over my face and giving me a whiff of her lavender-scented shampoo. “Gwen, hugging your boyfriend!”

 

“Don’t break him,” Gwen says offhandedly as she fishes her Biology book out of the bottom of her locker. “Oh, and Pete, I was thinking. You should design something for Harry, too.”

 

She stands and turns to me, quirking an eyebrow at Mary Jane, who releases me and gives me a little push toward Gwen.

 

“I actually am,” I say, gently colliding with Glen, who takes my arm and laces her fingers into mine as we head for first period. “I’ve got a flight system designed, and I’m gonna give him some collapsible armor like MJ’s.”

 

“Oh, is it a hoverboard like Back to the Future?” MJ asks with a grin. “That would be so sick.”

 

“Actually, it _is_ ,” I say. “I mean, Harry’s way into skateboarding, so why not? I’m even…kinda designing my own propulsion system that runs off of zero-point energy. I haven’t really gotten too far with it, but….”

 

I shrug, glancing over to see Gwen with that little disbelieving smile she gets sometimes when I talk about this sort of stuff. “You’re designing a propulsion system?” she asks. “Just…from the ground up?”

 

“Well, I mean, it’s sort of inspired by the X-Men’s Blackbird,” I say as we stroll to first period. “I read a bit about zero-point energy and how it can interact with Earth’s magnetic field, and I thought…you know, maybe a magnetic propulsion system. It would allow for more aerodynamic movement and wouldn’t require a full-on armored suit like Tony’s.”

 

“That sounds pretty awesome,” Gwen says. “It’ll be a good welcome-home present. Kinda like, ‘Welcome back, let’s go be superheroes again.’ I think it’ll be sweet.”

 

“Has he texted you guys at all?” Mary Jane asks. “How’s Cali?”

 

“He only texted me a few times,” I tell her. “He sent me a Snapchat of him at the World’s Largest Toilet with the words ‘Found your new house.’”

 

Mary Jane bursts into laughter at that, and even Gwen giggles, despite having been there when I got the message. “I’m sorry, that’s just still funny,” she says.

 

I roll my eyes, but it _was_ pretty good. “And he sent one when he got to LA and then another on his way to Aspen. He wants to do some snowboarding.”

 

“Of course he does,” Mary Jane says wryly. “At least he’s having fun, though. He could use some fun.”

 

“And when he gets back, he can join the Neighborhood Watch,” Gwen says with an impish little smirk up at me.

 

“We are _not_ calling our supergroup the Neighborhood Watch,” I say tiredly.

 

“Oh, we sure are,” Mary Jane insists, nodding vehemently. “I refuse to join a group called anything else.”

 

“It’s just so…silly,” I say, and Gwen pauses at the entrance to the Sociology classroom before Mary Jane breaks off for Integrated Math.

 

“You don’t like my group name?” Gwen asks, pouting up at me, hunching her shoulders and fixing me with those damn silvery blue eyes. “I thought it was good….”

 

“You…” I trail off, spinning and stalking into the classroom. Behind me, I hear Mary Jane giggle.

 

“Nicely done,” she says.

 

“Thank you,” Gwen says, and I can just hear the smirk in her voice.

 

Women.

 

……

 

Speaking of women.

 

They’re determined to make my life as mildly uncomfortable as possible.

 

The day passes fairly uneventfully up until my Journalism class. No one ever showed up to replace Jess, so I’ve been manning our table alone, clumping together with Cindy and Aaron at the neighboring table when a group project comes along. It’s been alright, albeit a bit lonely once in a while.

 

Now, it looks like I’m going to have some company, as a girl I’ve never seen at school before stalks into the classroom. Her arms are folded, her shoulders hunched defensively, and she sort of half-glares at anyone that looks at her, as though daring them to be even the slightest bit friendly to her. Her lips are set into a perpetual frown, painted with a dark shade of lipstick that works with her black jeans and striped red top to give her kind of a punkish look. The look is completed with a pair of fishnet wristbands and a black choker that looks like something right out of the goth scene of 2005, along with a matching black hairband.

 

The mystery girl stops to chat with Mr. Kepler for a moment, and I see him gesture toward my table.

 

Oh, this should be interesting.

 

As she nears me, I can’t shake the feeling that she looks familiar. She possibly takes my lingering glance as interest, because she gives me a sardonically expectant look as she flops into the seat next to me, bringing a waft of crisp cherry scent.

 

“Um, hi,” I say, glancing at her. “New here?”

 

“Wow, good guess,” she says, glancing over at me, her voice dripping with sarcasm. “Sherlock fucking Holmes over here.”

 

“Do you react to everything with utter contempt, or just people trying to be friendly?” I ask, smirking at her.

 

“Look, I don’t have any fucking time for a nerd and his creepy fucking flirting,” the girl says, and I finally realize why those icy blue eyes and dark mahogany hair look so familiar.

 

Lana!

 

The potty-mouthed Sparky-Sparky Boom Girl!

 

What the hell is she doing here? Did she get out of trouble because she’s a minor? Maybe they put her in a foster home and sent her to school to try to salvage what normal life they could for her?

 

Time to investigate. Subtly.

 

“No creepy flirting, promise,” I tell her. “I will confess to the nerd thing, though. Can’t really help that one.”

 

She scoffs, but she makes a point of resting her chin on her hand, facing me, so maybe I’m allowed to speak.

 

“I just wanted to, you know, get to know my new table buddy,” I say, and she snorts.

 

“’Table buddy’?” she asks. “Are we in kindergarten now?”

 

“I mean, the way some of these people act, you’d think so,” I say, gesturing at the class.

 

I’m rewarded with an amused little sound. “Yeah, no fucking kidding,” she says. “Like, hello, we’re three years away from being actual fucking adults, let’s try to act like it, people.”

 

“I guess they figure if they deny it and live in the moment, the future will just stay where it is,” I say, shrugging.

 

“Woah, look out, Friedrich Nietzsche dropping knowledge,” she says, smirking at me for a moment. “I’m Lana. And if you quote Archer at me, I will personally fucking murder you.”

 

“Peter,” I say. “Never really watched the show, kinda sorta familiar with it through YouTube and friends.”

 

“The worst part is, it’s actually a pretty good show,” Lana says with distasteful curl of her lips. “I just happen to have the same name as that one bitch, and Archer likes to yell it.”

 

“Hey, my name is a childish euphemism for male-parts,” I say. “I know all about the struggle. Why do you think I prefer to be called Pete?”

 

She actually gives me a little smirk. “Poor thing.”

 

“Oh no, you don’t even know the worst part,” I tell her. “My best friend’s name is Harry.”

 

She blinks, her eyes widening as a grin grows on her face. “Harry. Peter. Oh my god, middle school must have fucking sucked!”

 

“Middle school?” I ask. “Try all school, forever and even now.”

 

She grins as the bell rings, turning to face front when I do.

 

“Alright, I sure hope you guys all read the assignment about Margaret Bourke-White, because the quiz I had planned is canceled,” Mr. Kepler says as he walks into the classroom followed by an older guy, probably in his fifties. His graying hair is precisely cut in a very dated flat-top style, and his mustache is a perfect trapezoid over his upper lip. He wears a bland beige suit, and he looks out at us sternly but not angrily. I instantly recognize him; I looked him up after reading all of the vitriol he and his newspaper write about us, often completely fabricating stories or speculating well outside the realm of reason.

 

“Instead, I have a special treat for you guys,” Mr. Kepler says. “Ladies and gentlemen, this is John Jonah Jameson, Editor-in-Chief of the Daily Bugle and my former boss. He’s here to tell you a bit about the real world of journalism and answer any questions you might have.”

 

“Good afternoon, children,” Jameson says in a gruff voice. “Well, after being _pestered_ by Kevin – “

 

“Jonah, c’mon – “

 

“For _two weeks_ , Kevin, four e-mails a day, the phone calls,” Jameson says. “I’m _still_ clearing out my voicemails.”

 

“These kids are passionate about journalism,” he says, gesturing at the classroom. “It’d be good for them to hear from someone who’s been in the business for a long time, learned the tricks, made a name for himself.”

 

Jameson snorts. “’Passionate’ my foot,” he says. “The only thing these kids are passionate about is a high-school credit.”

 

“That’s not true,” Mr. Kepler says, glancing out at the class. “Maybe not all of them are going to go into journalism, but it’s better to learn and say no than to never know what’ you’re missing. What are you doing here if you were just going to ridicule a bunch of children?”

 

“You wouldn’t stop hounding me!” Jameson says. “So I’m here to prove to you that this whole teaching endeavor of yours is ill-advised, pointless, and – “

 

“Um…excuse me,” a voice cuts over him, and we look to see Cindy, who I think is half-Chinese or half-Korean, either one, raising her hand. She stands, and when Jameson glares in her direction, she doesn’t flinch, looking blandly back at him. “Hi, I’m Cindy Moon, actually planning on becoming a reporter someday, thank-you-very-much, and I was just wondering…why all the hate on the Spider-Trio? I mean, they’re just trying to help people.”

 

Jameson turns to her and rolls his eyes, folding his arms. “A fan?” he asks, and Cindy gestures pointedly at her t-shirt, which I only just notice has my latest spider logo on it.

 

I really need to find out who’s making all of this merchandise.

 

“A huge fan,” she says. “The Spider-Trio are inspirations; they’re proof that there are still people in the world who care enough about the good of their fellow man to go the extra mile.”

 

“Those three are proof that today’s youth doesn’t give a damn about the proper way of doing things,” he says. “If you don’t like crime and want to stop criminals, you become a police officer, you join the military, you don’t put on tights and go swinging around the city and making a spectacle of yourself. Look at the Terrific Trio. They have nothing to hide. They don’t wear masks or get in the way of the law. They’re government affiliates that know who to answer to and when they should leave things to the professionals.”

 

“But what do you have to say about the fact that crime rates have actually gone down since the Spider-Trio came around?” Cindy asks, and we all watch transfixed as she stares down a man forty years her senior. “Or the fact that the Hammerhead Family is all but finished after the Spider-Trio _not only_ publically exposed their leader but systematically eliminated most of their drug operations in New York City?”

 

I can’t help but bite back a smile as I look from Cindy, who’s gazing imperiously at Jameson, to the man himself, who looks like he’s trying to resist yelling at a high-school girl. Mister Kepler just looks proud as an uncle watching his favorite niece challenge the bigoted grandfather.

 

“I say that they did nothing the police or the government couldn’t have – “

 

“But the police _didn’t_ ,” Cindy says. “For five, ten years they didn’t. The Spider-Trio did. Would you rather the Hammerhead family was still out there, doing their thing?”

 

“Of course not,” Jameson says, frowning. “Don’t you twist my words, Missy. I’m saying that the Spider-Trio shouldn’t just run around fighting crime with impunity like this. Why do they wear masks, hm? What do they have to hide?”

 

“Uh, their identities,” Cindy says. “Would you go beat up a mob boss without a mask on? Oh, I’m sorry, former high-school boxing champ, you never took those skills out and used them, did you? Even _with_ a mask.”

 

“Now, you listen here!” Jameson growls. “Spider-Man and his little lackeys are nothing more than criminals that hide behind their delusions of grandeur! They wear masks because if anyone knew who they were, they would be arrested in an instant, which is no more than they deserve! How do you zealots know that they aren’t _behind_ all of these crimes they’re supposedly halting? Crimes happen, and they just _happen_ to be on the scene? Spider-Man gets kidnapped and shows up the next morning like nothing happened? He’s probably _in cahoots_ with that Superior Six! I bet he and his best buddy Doc Ock were yucking it up and drinking martinis while you were panicking over whether he was dead or alive.”

 

_Slam!_

 

I jump and look over to see Lana with her hands on our desk, standing and glaring daggers at Jameson.

 

“Spider-Man is a hero,” she says in a soft, dangerous voice. “He’s saved _lives_! What the fuck have you done!? Sat around in your office like some fat fucking tyrant king pointing at your little shit underlings, demanding they spew more hateful bullshit about someone you only _wish_ you were _half_ as cool as?”

 

A ringing silence follows this, and I look up to see her eyes shining.

 

I think I had an impact on her.

 

“I will not be spoken to in such a disrespectful manner!” Jameson says. “Kepler, what is this? You invite me here and then sic your students on me like some Comedy Central roast? This is a circus!”

 

“Lana, while we encourage free speech, this is still a school, and we don’t tolerate foul language,” Mister Kepler says calmly. “Jonah, I’m sorry, but that should go a long way to illustrate how passionate the youth of New York are about someone they consider a hero.”

 

“He’s a clown!” Jameson says. “A criminal!”

 

“Spider-Man _is_ a hero!” Cindy says. “I think you’re just jealous that he’s the one that took his skills and used them for actual heroism instead of hiding away in an office building and writing about how much you hate people just because they’re all-around _better_ than you.”

 

Jameson growls and storms down the aisle, and I find myself standing and intervening, stepping in front of Cindy and looking coolly up at the older man, who just glares at me.

 

“Another fan?” he asks levelly.

 

“I just wanna make sure you don’t lose yourself in the moment,” I say, smirking up at him. “You look like a guy that didn’t quite finish screwing the lid onto his temper and just hopes no one shakes it up too bad.”

 

He snorts and turns, making his way for the door. “We’re done here, Kepler,” he says. “If you decide you want to _apologize_ and leave this teaching nonsense behind, give me a call.

 

I turn to see Cindy giving me a bemused smile. “You alright?” I ask her, and she just giggles.

 

“Were you about to beat him up for me?” she asks with a smile, and I shrug.

 

“There’s probably a thousand reasons to beat him up,” I tell her. “Heck, I’d probably get like a hundred thank-you cards if I did.”

 

She smirks, shoving me gently toward my seat. “Go sit down, Mr. Hero,” she says, and I settle into my chair, glancing over to see Lana looking at me with wide eyes.

 

“No fucking way,” she whispers. “Spider-Man.”

 

Well, shit.

 

……

 

“It’s you!” she says, a huge smile on her face. “It’s…. That dorky sassy shit you’re always saying when you never shut the fuck up, that…. Holy fucking shit, it’s actually, really you!”

 

“Okay, for real, let’s not make a production of this, alright?” I ask. “I…yeah, okay, I’m…the guy, but – “

 

“You saved my life,” she says, pulling me to a stop and looking up at me. “They…the paramedics said I would’ve died if you hadn’t saved me. That car was fully on fire when they got there. You actually really saved my fucking life.”

 

“Well, I mean, I do that a lot of th-mph!” My protestations are cut off by the fact that she’s kissing me. It’s pleasant for all of a second or two before I realize I’m kissing a girl that’s definitely not Gwen Stacy, which is a serious problem I have the power to fix.

 

I gently push her away, and she gasps.

 

“No,” she squeaks.

 

“Girlfriend” I say, and she presses her hand to her forehead.

 

“I didn’t just do that.”

 

“I mean, we can pretend that’s the case.”

 

She whines. “I’m so sorry.”

 

“It’s…I mean, girls get emotional?” I offer.

 

“Sexist,” she says flatly.

 

“Well…I’m sorry, I’m just giving you excuses,” I say. She huffs and looks up at me.

 

“I got lipstick on you,” she says, and I hasten to wipe it away. “Sorry, it’s this super fucking cheapo brand from like Walmart. I’m staying with some foster family, and this woman is…she’s nice, but holy shit is she stingy.”

 

“What happened to your mom?” I ask, glancing down the hall. “And what’s your next class?”

 

“Life Skills,” she says. “You?”  


“Same, actually,” I say, jerking a thumb over my shoulder. “This way.”

 

She follows, sighing a bit as we walk. “Okay, so my mom is still at large,” she says, “but she’s probably looking for me, since like I said, we can’t do our explodey thing without being around each other. They put me in school, figured I was just an impressionable youth goaded into a bunch of criminal bullshit.”

 

“And now you’re gonna try to have a normal life?” I ask, and she nods.

 

“I promise,” she says. “No more of that criminal shit. I only really did it because…well, Mom was all I had, so I wanted her to actually like me, I guess.”

 

“You shouldn’t have to try to make your parents like you,” I say. “They’re the ones that kinda forced this life on you, the least they can do is try to help you make the best of it.”

 

“Well, my fucking Mom acts like _I’m_ the one making _her_ miserable,” she grumbles. “Or…acted. Now I’m with some fifty-something grandma that has twin nine-year-old boys and two other foster kids.”

 

“Sounds rough,” I tell her as we walk into the Life Skills room. She follows me right to my desk, and when I sit, she glances around, looking so much like a lost puppy that I gesture at Jess’s old seat. “Sit. The table’s down two people anyway.”

 

She plants herself in the chair, digging around in her backpack. “What happened?” she asks. “No one died, did they? Am I fucking sitting in the girl that died’s seat?”

 

“No one died,” I insist, and she gives me a curious look. “Jess, the girl that used to sit here, got moved away by her family after a mutated lizard attacked the school. And the other guy, Flash, joined the X-Men after his mutant powers awoke last weekend.”

 

“I’m going to the fucking Hogwarts of superheroes, I swear,” Lana says, shaking her head. “Is this because of you?”

 

“I mean…the lizard thing, maybe,” I say, shrugging. “But I definitely don’t know how to activate mutant powers.”

 

“That’s just what you probably _want_ people to think,” she says with a little smirk, and I shake my head.

 

“No, you mustn’t tell anyone my secrets,” I say, and just snorts, tossing her pencil at me, but I catch it in the air.

 

“You are just too fucking charming,” she says. “Like…you can do all of this awesome…spider stuff,” she says that part in a low voice, at least, “and then you take the mask off and you’re this total fucking dork. Your girlfriend must get anxiety attacks thinking about how many chicks are just in love with you.”

 

It’s like she knows everything about me.

 

“Haha, I’m right,” she says in a singsong voice. “Who else?”

 

The way she so casually talks about the fact that she has a crush on me is refreshing.

 

“Well…I probably shouldn’t say anything out of respect – “

 

“Oh, I’m not gonna fucking tell anyone,” she says with a sigh. “Who would I tell? That dorky-ass guidance counselor?”

 

I lean back in my seat, taking a deep breath. “So, Jess, the girl whose seat you have? She was my first girlfriend, and we only broke up because she moved away and thought I should have a not-long-distance girlfriend since…my uncle had just died. And then there’s this girl Mary Jane, who is one of my best friends lately, and she has this huge crush on me but we don’t really talk about it. Oh, and Kitty Pryde, one of the X-Men, has this huge hero thing for Spider-Man, with like posters and everything. And some girl that sent me a secret admirer thing on Valentine’s Day, but I don’t really know.”

 

She’s laughing quietly by the end of this, fighting a smile. “I’m sorry, it’s just…your face, you fucking hate this.”

 

I grumble and lean forward, resting my elbows on the table and slumping my face into my hands. “And I’m discussing this with you, a retired super-criminal who I’ve just met.”

 

“Yeah, but don’t you feel way fucking better now?” she asks. I let a noncommittal little humming sound.

 

“Little bit,” I say. “I guess it’s nice to air it out to someone that’s not directly involved. Sort of.”

 

She glances over at me with a small smile. “I get you to myself for two classes a day, that’s just gravy to me. If I can help you sort out all your little romantic shit, so much the better, right?”

 

“I’m so lucky,” I say flatly, and she winks at me.

 

“Oh no, poor Peter Parker, swimming in girls and only able to choose one,” she says, rolling her eyes. “Boys would kill to have that problem.”

 

“They can _have_ it,” I tell her. “I mean, it’s…. It makes me feel bad. All of these girls like me, and…I dunno, I feel guilty.”

 

“What?” she asks. “That’s fucking stupid, don’t feel that way. I mean, that’s dumb, but that’s also insulting to them. They’ll get the fuck over it, and if they don’t, that’s their fucking problem.”

 

I shrug. “Well, yeah…I mean, you’re right,” I say, smiling up at her. “You actually made me feel better about this. Thanks.”

 

She rolls her eyes. “If you want a tip, though, don’t smile like a dork like that,” she says.

 

“This is my smile,” I say defensively. “It’s not dorky.”

 

“It is like seven levels of dorky,” she says. “On a scale of one to ten, it’s like a solid fifteen dorky.”

 

“You’re biased,” I say as Liz Allan strolls in and sits at the end of our table. “Liz, is my smile dorky?”

 

“Um, only very,” she says with a smirk. “Pete, everything about you is dorky. I mean, it’s actually really cute, but still…I thought you knew.”

 

Great.

 

“So…have you talked to Flash?” I ask, changing the subject. She shrugs, giving me a wan little smile.

 

“He texted me a couple times but…I dunno,” she says. “We were already kinda drifting. I mean, he’s a sweetheart, but sometimes I feel more like we’re just friends hanging out, and he’s doing the boyfriend stuff just because he feels like he _should_.”

 

“Going through the motions?” I ask, and she nods.

 

“I’m gonna text him tonight and ask how he’d feel about breaking things off,” I say. “I’m willing to try to make it work, but I just wanna know if _he_ is or not.”

 

“That sounds fair,” I say. “You guys worked well together, though.”

 

She smiles fondly at the memories. “Yeah, it was great back in the day,” she says. “But…y’know, like I said, we started to drift. It’s like…a month or so ago, he just…lost interest in what we had going on. It felt like he was only dating me because he felt like he would be disappointing me if he didn’t.”

 

“That’s…polite of him, at least,” I say. “But it’s not fair to either of you.”

 

She nods. “That’s what I figured, but it’s nice to hear you agree,” she says with a little smile. “I know it’s a little selfish, but we both deserve happiness.”

 

“Everyone’s entitled to be a bit selfish,” I say. “My uncle always used to say, ‘It’s nice to dream of saving the world, but don’t forget that that includes you.’”

 

Liz smiles warmly at me. “Your uncle was a smart man.”

 

“Yeah,” I agree, glancing down, tapping a pencil against the desk as I take a deep breath, pushing away a wave of melancholy. “Yeah, he was.”

 

……

 

Mary Jane knew that with Peter Parker, it was to be expected that he would just…attract girls. He was cute, smart, and a total nerd, and his nerd-outs only made him that much cuter.

 

It was part of the reason she was hopelessly in love with him.

 

So when Peter strolled into Phys Ed with a dark-haired girl in tow, her first thought was that the new girl had gravitated toward him simply because he put off this friendly, harmless vibe and seemed a natural candidate to show her around.

 

But as Peter introduced the girl as Lana Baumgartner, told them she knew he was Spider-Man, and said she should probably stick with Gwen and Mary Jane, all in the same breath of course, she could tell that Lana was another that had fallen victim to the Parker charm.

 

The look in her eyes as she watched him dash away to change was the same sort of look Mary Jane often saw Gwen wearing when Peter had done something endearingly stupid. The exasperated little smile, the shake of the head, and the little sigh.

 

“He’s an idiot,” Lana said, and Mary Jane laughed.

 

“He’s the kind of absent-minded genius that has a ton of potential and needs a squad of friends to keep him on track,” she countered, and Lana snickered as Gwen burst out laughing.

 

“Yeah, sounds about right,” Lana said, turning to them and following as they led her to the locker room. “Um…so, I’m Lana, and I hate Archer, so please don’t toss that fucking quote at me. Peter…saved my life when me and my mom were working with Jack O’Lantern? Do you know about that?”

 

“Oh, the exploding powers?” Gwen said, and she nodded. “Wow, that’s you?”

 

“I’m…reforming, I guess,” she said. “It turns out Mom’s a self-serving bitch that will ditch her own daughter to stay out of prison. Spider-Man…saved my life. Like…literally, I would have fucking died. And in Journalism he went all hero when the guest speaker was trying to intimidate some girl.”

 

“Wait, what happened?” Mary Jane asked. She’d heard about a commotion in Journalism, but no details.

 

“It’s a whole…thing that you’ll probably hear about later,” she said as they deposited their bags and dug out their gym clothes, making sure they were far enough away from any prying ears. “Anyway, he did his little fighting pose, and I recognized that, plus he said this smartass little comment.”

 

“And you recognized him just from that?” Gwen asked. Lana shrugged.

 

“I like him, sue me,” she said.

 

“Like him, as in…” Gwen paused after pulling her gym shorts up.

 

“You’re the girlfriend, aren’t you?” Lana asked, smirking. “Look, I’m not gonna try to steal your man or anything, but I wanna be straight with you. I like him. A lot. He saved my life, and even just like getting to know him this long, he’s completely the kind of person I thought he’d be, so…. Just wanted to be level with you. I could also use, like…friends, though, too. Cool?”

 

Gwen looked taken aback for a few seconds before smiling. “Well, Peter would tell me to give you a chance, so I guess, yeah, cool,” she said.

 

Wow. Gwen was alright with this girl basically saying she was in love with Peter? She probably _had_ to be; it wasn’t like it was hard to at least get a little crush on Pete, once you got to know him. From what Gwen had told Mary Jane during their many chats during Phys Ed, Kitty Pryde of the X-Men had a little candle for him, and there was Mary Jane’s own crush, which she had alluded to but never outright confessed to her friend.

 

Maybe with Lana around, she would have someone to commiserate with. Heck, maybe the brunette would be willing to go out sometime, and they could drag Gwen along and go on a girls-only outing. Gwen and Mary Jane weren’t super besties yet, but Gwen was also great in that she had been willing to welcome Mary Jane into the friend group, and the two had even bonded over the fact that they had been raised by single parents, Gwen having been raised only by her father while Mary Jane had had only her mother.

 

“MJ?” Gwen asked, and Mary Jane blinked, calling herself back to the present to see Gwen peering up at her. “C’mon, kid, let’s go kick ass.”

 

Giggling, Mary Jane followed her. “You know I’m like three months older than you.”

 

“Yeah, but since I’m the one with more breathtaking life experiences, I’m emotionally mature..er than you,” Gwen said.

 

“I don’t think it works that way,” Mary Jane said, and Gwen waved an airy hand.

 

“Details,” she said, watching as Lana walked over to present a note to the teacher. She gently tugged at Mary Jane’s wrist. “So…what do you think of her?”

 

“I think she’s head over tits for Peter,” Mary Jane said immediately. “You can see it in her eyes.”

 

“Yeah, I know the look pretty well by now,” Gwen muttered with a significant glance at Mary Jane, who hastened to defend herself.

 

“I – “

 

“Have proven to me that you’re very trustworthy,” Gwen cut over her with a gentle smile. “A lot. You’re a good friend. And Lana…could be. She seems like she’s…lost or something. To me, at least. I think she hasn’t had someone to depend on for a long time.”

 

“She definitely fronts like some kind of tough girl, but I feel like she has a nice side,” Mary Jane said.

 

“You mean I have to run around like a fucking _tool_ on _day one_!?” Lana yelled from where she was introducing herself to the gym teacher. “What the fuck kinda bullshit is _that_!?”

 

“Maybe it’s more like layers,” Gwen said dubiously. “Like…with a nice layer way deep down.”

 

“Better start peeling them back,” Mary Jane said with a smirk. “We might find the nice one by graduation.”

 

……

 

This has to be one of the most entertaining gym classes I can ever remember, watching Lana Baumgartner, who has apparently had enough of this “no child left behind fitness bullshit”, attempt to play two-on-two basketball against Gwen and MJ while partnered with a girl named Carlie. As I watch her miss another basket, she launches into another tirade about the evils of basketball and how “If I wanted to play basketball I’d’ve joined the fucking _team_!”

 

When all four of them look over at my burst of laughter, I quickly turn away and sink another bucket, much to the appreciation of my own partner, Kong, who constantly seeks me out to carry him through the year. Honestly, I welcome the challenge. I don’t wanna turn too many heads with my sudden boost in athleticism, especially since I know a lot of my classmates fondly remember my beleaguered attempts at any form of physical activity from previous years. Thankfully, there was usually at least one student that took me on as a sort of charity case.

 

If I can be the one that takes on the charity case this time around, I’ll be happy to.

 

To his credit, Kong’s trying his best to block Danny and Cody from making their shots.

 

His best is just not good enough.

 

Danny takes the shot, and it would be painfully easy for me to jump and knock it away, but it already seems unfair that I’m _this_ good at basketball thanks exclusively to a spider bite. So I put on my acting pants and jump, making a wide sweep of my hand that looks passably like a failed attempt at a block.

 

I hope.

 

The ball sinks into the basket, and Danny cheers, turning to slap a high-five with Cody.

 

“Nice shot, Danny,” I tell him, and he smirks.

 

“Thanks, Parker,” he says. “Kong, c’mon, your partner’s carrying you, boy.”

 

“Fuck it, man, I don’t do this sports shit,” Kong says with a wave of his hand, taking a swig from a water bottle that I’m pretty sure is filled with Mountain Dew. “I’m gonna race. Craftsman truck series, bro.”

 

“I’m pretty sure there’s a weight limit on those cars, right?” Danny points out, and Cody snickers.

 

“Hey, everyone’s gotta have a dream, right?” I say as we line up and Danny bounces me the ball. I dribble it once, taking a step back and sinking a cool three-pointer. “Why not dream big?”

 

“Yeah, Petey knows how it is,” Kong says, grinning as he laboriously recovers the ball and tosses it to me. “You never know, Mom and Dad are sending me to fat camp this summer. I could come back all buff and blow you guys away.”

 

“I hope you do,” I say, grinning at him as I pass the ball off to Cody. “I bet you come back looking like the Rock and get all the girls.”

 

“You know it,” Kong says. “Hey, if Pete can get good at sports, so can I.”

 

“Eh, I’m not that good,” I say, shrugging and snagging the ball away from Cody. “It’s all about angles and inertia and math stuff.”

 

“Right, I was on the basketball team for two years, and you used math to get better at it than me,” Cody says as I sink another basket.

 

Maybe I’m not being subtle enough?

 

“Anyway, that girl that came in with you?” Kong asks, grinning at me. “Get her name?”

 

“Her name is Lana, and she is way too much woman for you,” I tell him, prompting all three to laugh.

 

“Hey, man, he weighs like two-fifty,” Danny says. “If anything, he’s too much man.”

 

“I’d love to see you put that to the test,” I say with a smirk.

 

Kong glances around, making sure the teacher is distracted with his phone before making his way over to where Lana is attempting to dribble the ball with movements exaggerated by how frustrated she seems to be.

 

“Oh my God, he’s going for it,” Danny says, grinning hugely and glancing back at Cody, who just shakes his head.

 

Kong boldly strides up to Lana, who eyes his approach with open distaste. I have to give the guy credit; he’s persistent in the face of almost certain failure. I don’t quite hear what he says, my hearing having been only slightly enhanced since the spider bite, but I make out the words “’sup girl” and “holler at you sometime”, followed by an expression of such open disbelief on Lana’s face that I burst out laughing, covering my mouth when she glares at me.

 

“Get the hell out of my face, you fat fuck!” Lana yells at him, and a grinning Kong makes his way back over, chuckling at us.

 

“I think she likes me.”

 

……

 

“I swear, if you put him up to that, I will find out how to use my powers by myself just so I can explode you,” Lana says as we make our way out to the bus stop after gym.

 

“Why would I try to set you up with _Kong_?” I ask, snickering. “And why would I _jokingly_ do it and risk explodey doom?”

 

“Pick it up, lazy-butts!” Mary Jane yells, backtracking at a swift jog to grab my hand in both of hers and pull me toward the bus stop. “I wanna get to your place and try on my new – “

 

“MJ,” I say, glancing around to where a few people are looking at us, and I swear I hear someone mutter the words “another one” with a look at Lana.

 

Maybe keeping a low profile is just a lost cause?

 

We step out into the breezy afternoon. The sky is overcast, but the weather report didn’t call for rain. It’s a perfect afternoon for MJ to take the Jackpot suit for a test run. As we head for the bus stop, Johnny joins us.

 

“Parker!” he calls, hurrying over but pausing when he sees Lana, who peers at him just as curiously as he peers back. “For real? Another?”

 

“Johnny, this is Lana,” I tell him, and he grins widely before I cut across him. “She hates Archer, and she’s a little tired of everyone saying her name like that.”

 

“Wow, duly noted,” he says, chuckling at Lana’s decidedly unamused look. He cants his head to the side, blinking a few times. “Hey, wait, you’re the girl! The, um…” he wiggles his fingers and makes a _kaboom_ sound. Lana smirks.

 

“You must be the…” she mimes an invisible wall in front of her, and Johnny laughs.

 

“Yo, I like that,” he says, doing a little mime maneuver of his own. “Pete, check it out. It’s a wall.”

 

“I think you’re a pretty terrible mime if you have to actually explain what you’re miming,” I point out, and he grins.

 

“Eh, that’s probably why I’m _not_ a mime,” he says. “So, are you reforming? Leaving behind your villainous ways?”

 

“Yes,” she says with sarcastic fervor. “I have seen the light, and the power of love and friendship and stuff has inspired me to do good or something.”

 

“Let’s go, Tiger!” Mary Jane calls from the bus stop. I didn’t even notice she and Gwen leaving us. Johnny waves over to them before turning to Lana.

 

“Is she coming to the super-secret club meeting?” he asks.

 

We glance at her, and she shrugs. “I don’t wanna crash your little powwow,” she says.

 

“No crashing, exploding, remember?” Johnny says. “C’mon, she’s already in the know, why not get some input from someone who’s seen the criminal underbelly of New York?”

 

“Oh, not even,” Lana says wryly. “The most Mom and I ever got up to was jewelry heists and one armored-car robbery that got stopped by the Daredevil.”

 

“Still, though, he’s got a point,” I say. “If you remember anything about, like, people your mom talked to to plan these jobs and stuff, it’d be helpful.”

 

She gives me a level look. “What are you planning to do?”

 

“Take down the criminal empire of New York, clean up the city, idealistic stuff like that,” I say. She smirks, bumping into me to push me toward the bus.

 

“Alright, wide-eyes, let’s go fuck up crime.”

 

I chuckle, and she follows, the five of us clustering together to climb onto the bus. Gwen steps on behind me, her hands running smooth circles over my back as I walk along the aisle.

 

“Hey, you,” she whispers into my ear as I find us a seat, making room for her to squeeze in before I settle next to her. MJ and Lana take the seat opposite us, and Johnny sits behind them. Gwen leans on me, nestling against my shoulder. “How was your day?”

 

“Good,” I say, nodding. “Made friends, changed lives, the usual.”

 

“Always the hero,” she giggles against me. “So…” she leans in, lowering her voice to a whisper, “I…heard a rumor. Cindy Moon said…Lana kissed you? I mean, I figured it was just a rumor, but if there’s anything you wanna tell me….”

 

“Ah, I was…gonna tell you, promise,” I say, and she frowns. I hasten to explain. “It was like…half a second. She didn’t know I had a girlfriend, and…I saved her life, and she’s going through a lot of stuff – “

 

“Pete,” she says with a soft little smile, placing a finger against my lips before leaning in and kissing me softly. “Relax. I’m not mad. I’m…irritated, but I figured it was something like that. You have that effect on girls, after all.”

 

I smile sheepishly at her. “I’m sorry about that.”

 

She rolls her eyes, poking me in the nose. “Like you can help it, you doofus,” she says. “Look, I…I love you so much, but I know what it’s like to be in love with Peter Parker and not be able to be _with_ you. So I’m not gonna like freak out every time I hear about a girl getting a crush on you. I’d have an anxiety attack in like two days. Just…try to avoid anything like that happening again?”

 

I snicker, nuzzling my nose against hers. “I will. I love you, too.”

 

She smiles sweetly at me. “Promise?”

 

“I mean, if you want, I’ll get your name in a big fancy heart tattooed like…right here,” I lean back and gesture at my chest. “Just a big-ass tattoo, with like flames and a dragon and a heart.”

 

“Shut up,” she giggles, shaking her head and shoving my playfully. “You’re such a dweeb.”

 

“I’m your dweeb, though,” I point out, and she sighs, leaning against me.

 

“I know,” she says in a soft, happy little voice.

 

The rest of bus ride passes in an easy silence, with MJ occasionally pelting me with questions about her new armor while I deflect and tell her to wait until we get to my place. Soon, the bus pulls to our stop, and we climb off, Lana looking around the neighborhood dubiously.

 

“You live here?” she asks. “I honestly thought you’d live in like…some ritzy Manhattan penthouse with your manservant and a super-secret lair.”

 

“I’m not some rich TV superhero,” I say with a smirk, grabbing the mail as we pass the mailbox. “My secret lair is my lab in my basement, and the closest thing I have to a manservant is Johnny.”

 

“If you ever actually refer to me as your manservant, I will end you,” Johnny says. “Get one of your girlfriends to do your heavy lifting.”

 

“Hey, if I get armor out of it, I’ll do some heavy lifting,” MJ says, hurrying up the steps to the Parker household. She opens it and strolls in like she lives there, which given how much time she spends at my house, she kind of does, almost. Aunt May isn’t home yet, so the place is quiet as we cross the small entryway to the basement. The entire time, Lana is looking around with open wonderment, a small bemused smile on her face.

 

“For real, you just live in a house in Queens?” she asks. “This is fucking surreal.”

 

“Sorry I don’t live up to the hype,” I say, tossing the mail onto the table except for one envelope addressed to me. “Huh. I never get mail.”

 

“Who’s it from?” Gwen asks, peering over my shoulder. “’Oscorp Industries Financial Department’?”

 

I open the envelope and find a letter, unfolding it and reading.

 

_Dear Mr. Parker,_

_We’re pleased to inform you that you have been accepted into Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry._

_Just kidding. It’s Tony. This is good news, though. I thought you’d like to know that T’Challa, who happens to be the king of the nation of Wakanda, saw your designs when I was machining them the other day. Apparently, they work really well with vibranium, and it’s not nearly as expensive to make as a full suit of Stark armor. He’s been looking for a design that he can use to protect his armies against some foreign incursions, and he offered a tidy sum for an army’s worth of what I’m calling the Parker Deployable Defense System._

_If you don’t like the name, we can work it._

_So, since it’s your design, I’m enclosing your portion of the down payment. The rest will get sent along once the exchange is complete._

_Regards,_

_Tony_

 

“Holy shit,” I say, setting the letter aside and looking at the check.

 

“Pete, what’s – “

 

“ _Holy shit!_ ”

 

“What?” Gwen asks, and Johnny and Lana gather around as well. Mary Jane emerges from the basement lugging the box that contains her armor, depositing it on the table and looking at the check as well.

 

“Oh…oh, wow,” she says softly.

 

“Five-hundred thousand?” Gwen asks. “Pete, this is a check for five-hundred thousand dollars.”

 

“I can see that,” I say absently.

 

“Fuckin’ shit,” Lana says. “Now you’re smart, charming, superpowered, _and_ rich.”

 

“I…oh, what do I do?” I ask, and Gwen takes my wrist.

 

“Deposit it, sit on it for a while,” she says softly. “Put it somewhere safe, and let’s just show MJ her new armor for now.”

 

“I…yeah,” I say, hurrying downstairs and finding the small safe I bought last week. I press my thumb to the scanner I rigged it up with and wait for the pneumatic hiss as it unlocks, opening it and placing the check carefully inside. Shutting it again, I head back upstairs to find MJ sliding into the skintight leggings and top of her new suit. Nearby, Johnny has his hands over his eyes, held there by Lana, who glances over as I emerge from the basement.

 

“Eyes shut,” she says, but MJ is already straightening her shirt in place, so all I get is a view of her back. I still cover my eyes with my hands, because I’m a gentleman like that, but soon, they’re pulled away, and I see MJ standing there with a smile.

 

“Show me how to put this stuff on,” she says, leading me over to the box. I quickly guide her through the process of putting on the sensors, which just look like jewelry. A thick pendant in the shape of a gear (for the steampunk lover), two bracelets, two anklets, a belt buckle, and a thick, heavy square the size of the average textbook that unfolds into the actual armor.

 

“What’re those for?” Johnny asks, gesturing at the accessories.

 

“They’re sensor nodules for the armor,” I say. “The armor uses them to find out where MJ is and where her limbs are in relation to her body so it can get into position. Alright, we should probably head outside for the next bit.”

 

MJ practically sprints for the backdoor, and we follow, gathering in the warm spring afternoon. Lana settles onto a chair on the small porch in the backyard, Johnny leaning on the railing near her while Gwen follows me down the steps. MJ waits in the middle of the backyard, quivering with excitement.

 

“Okay,” I tell her. “It’s a vocal command, so you say ‘Jackpot armor, deploy’.”

 

“Jackpot armor, deploy!” she says happily, and the square she’s holding jerks from her hands, finding the pendant and latching onto her chest before unfolding over her. Layer after layer folds away, wrapping her arms and legs. A thick chest piece settles over her, bearing a red _777_ insignia, as ordered, and a helmet wraps over her head, red goggles settling over her eyes. To top it off, thick gauntlets settle over her hands, small glowing red disks on the back of each hand.

 

“Okay, that’s pretty awesome,” Johnny says. “Like some kind of anime transformation sequence.”

 

“Pete, this is perfect!” MJ says, skipping happily in place. The armor itself is mostly black with gold undertones and, again as ordered, red accents. It looks less like a Stark suit of armor and more like tactical military gear.

 

I guess I can see why T’Challa was so interested in it, whoever he is.

 

“Woah!” MJ says, and I shake out of my thoughts to see her waving her hand, where a red hard-light disk about two feet in diameter is growing from the gauntlet. “Energy shields!”

 

“Well, you found out how to turn those on,” I say. “Both hands do that.”

 

She curls all of the fingers in on both hands, and twin shields spring up. She holds them out in front of her and strikes a pose, bracing her feet.

 

“You! Shall not! Pass!” she shouts, and I snicker.

 

“Alright, Gandalf, listen for a sec,” I say, and she deactivates the shields, looking at me attentively. “Now, those gauntlets have all kinds of stuff. You remember the less-lethal bullets in the web-shooters? And the zappy fingers?”

 

She gasps, nodding and curling fingers in just like I do to activate the tasers, and her fingers crackle. “Ah! I have zappy fingers!”

 

“Good, now show me the less-lethal shot,” I tell her, pointing to a nearby tree. “Uh, Johnny, wanna toss a shield up around us?”

 

I back up and pull Gwen to the porch before a translucent purple-blue barrier shimmers around the four of us, and Mary Jane holds her hands out, curling her two middle fingers in.

 

 _Thwup-thwup!_ _Crack!_

 

The tree splinters visibly as two hard rubber bullets fly into it before bouncing away and pinging off Johnny’s barrier. In the distance, a clatter of metal sounds, followed by a cat shrieking.

 

“Hey, let’s not do that again,” I say, hurrying down the steps as Johnny dissipates the barrier. Mary Jane turns to me with a giant smile on her face, eyes wide with wonder behind her goggles as she hugs me.

 

“Ah! Pete, this is awesome!”

 

“That’s not all yet,” I say. “See those little buttons on your index fingers, here?”

 

She backs away and looks to where I’m pointing, nodding once.

 

“Press both of them at once with your thumbs,” I say, and she does so, gasping.

 

“Ah!” she squeaks as four golden legs unfurl from behind her, curling and waving around.

 

“Hey, careful, careful!” I say. “They’re sensitive to your thoughts, which is why I had to make them deployable so you didn’t accidentally,” I break off as she smacks a bird feeder off of a low-hanging branch of the oak in the yard, “um…do something like that.”

 

“I’m sorry!” she squeaks, taking a deep breath. Just like that, the legs calm, moving down and pressing into the ground to lift her up. “Oh, that’s…weird.” She curls her legs in, blinking and shuffling forward on the legs. “Oh, okay!”

 

“Yeah, there’s a small chip I put in that’s able to pick up electrical pulses from your brain and translate them into commands for the legs,” I say. “There’s about a point oh-two percent margin of error, but you should be able to just think them where you wanna go.”

 

“Which is easy to say, but holy shit, you’re a genius,” Mary Jane says flatly, scuttling around the yard.

 

“Beat me to it,” Gwen calls from the porch.

 

“Can we like go out on patrol and take this thing for a spin?” MJ asks, crawling back toward me…and not quite stopping. “Oh! Ah, no, no!”

 

I jump out of the way. “Tap the buttons!” I say, and she squeaks as the legs drop her to her feet, curling up into the little disk on her back.

 

“Let’s get you used to the legs before we go patrolling,” I say, and she gives me a sheepish smile.

 

“Spoilsport.”

 

……

 

That night, after extracting no less than five separate promises from Mary Jane that she would _not_ use the Jackpot armor without Gwen or myself present, I felt comfortable sending her home with it. She’s not the type to break a promise, especially to me.

 

Hey, I can mentally acknowledge that she’s in love with me, even if it’s uncomfortable to think about sometimes.

 

Staring at the computer screen in front of me, I ponder my next super-suit, this one for Harry. Mary Jane’s has booster jets and legs to help her get around, but I think Harry would love the zero-point powered glider I mentioned earlier. I could give him some gadgets like MJ’s, get his input on what he wants. I’m sure he’ll have more than a few ideas that are just too imaginative to actually make real, but it should at least help me figure out what I _can_ make that he’d like.

 

“What do you think of calling him the Hobgoblin?” I ask, and I hear a soft sigh behind me.

 

“I didn’t make a sound!” Gwen protests, and I spin to see her standing there in a hoody and sweats, which she quickly dispenses, leaving her in only a large sleep shirt as she climbs into my lap. “How did you know I was there?”

 

I tap my nose. “Don’t take this the wrong way, but…you have a scent,” I tell her. “Like…your shampoo or something. It’s like fruit and cinnamon.”

 

“I’m sure a lot of girls smell like fruit and cinnamon,” she says, peering at my screen.

 

“Well, they don’t have the same…I dunno, essence?” I ask. “I’m trying not to be creepy here.”

 

“Not creepy,” she tells me. “Honestly, _you_ kinda have a scent to you that no other guy has. Like…pine and the smell of a bonfire or something. It’s super faint, but I can always pick you out.”

 

“Spider pheromones?” I guess, and she smirks.

 

“Maybe,” she says, running her hands over my chest. “I think we’re still a bit young to be exploring that much further right now, though.”

 

“Hey, I wasn’t gonna take it there,” I say with a grin, and she giggles, leaning in to drop a kiss on my lips.

 

“I know,” she says. “Such a gentleman spy…der.”

 

“Gwen Stacy, did you just make a pun?” I ask in mock amazement.

 

“I’ll never confess!” she says theatrically, swooning against me, and I smirk.

 

“Alright, you teenage pun-away,” I say, and she shakes her head.

 

“Noooo, out-punned again,” she says, turning back to the screen. “Oh, that’s neat.”

 

I wrap an arm around her waist, my other one going to the mouse to spin the 3D render of the armor I’m conceptualizing for Harry. “Like I said, I was thinking of calling him the Hobgoblin. You know how Norman’s the Iron Goblin?”

 

“That’d be neat,” she says, nodding. “I’d run it by him first, though. He’ll probably wanna be something totally radical, like the Silver Surfer.”

 

I blink, canting my head to the side. With a few small clicks, the tone of the armor changes from the orange I’d been working with to a solid silver sheen. “That’s actually pretty cool,” I say. “We’ll think on it. For now, I’m beat, and it’s a school night.”

 

“Bed,” Gwen says, crawling to her feet and leaping onto my bed. She slides under the covers, shuffling around, and after a moment, her hand comes out from under the blankets, tossing her shirt onto the ground. She gasps playfully. “Uh-oh, where’d that come from?”

 

“I shall have to find out,” I say grandly, smirking and standing. “Computer, save current project and shutdown.”

 

My computer chirps behind me, and I make my way to bed as well, climbing under the covers with Gwen, who’s hiding with the blankets tucked up to her chin.

 

“Peter, someone’s stolen my shirt,” she says. “We have a crime scene!”

 

“Well, time to investigate,” I say, and she giggles, reaching up and turning off my bedside lamp, leaving us in darkness.

 

……

 

Norman couldn’t help but feel a swell of pride as he looked over the new headquarters of the Avengers, a rather nondescript building in Manhattan that looked like nothing more than another office high-rise from the outside, in keeping with their desire to keep a low profile. They were getting something done, though, changing things on a national, even international scale. America needed saving, and to that end, he’d been given acting command of a crack team of superheroes.

 

Superheroes. That’s what the general public thought of them as. Miss Fantastic, the Human Torch, The Mighty Thor (which Miss Romanova insisted was a title and not a name), and the Iron Quartet consisting of Iron Man, Iron Marvel, Iron Goblin, and Iron Patriot.

 

Speaking of the latter, that particular role still needed filling, but Nick Fury had already sent along a prospective candidate, a decorated military officer that had received a rather glowing recommendation from the Deputy Director. Something Fury had said in his last (very encrypted) e-mail correspondence had stuck with Norman as well.

 

_“If you need any more of a reason to hire him, just ask your pal Stark.”_

 

How did Tony Stark know a colonel in the US Army?

 

“ _Sir, there is a Colonel James Rhodes here to see you_ ,” Jarvis said.

 

“Send him in,” Norman said, standing and turning to look out the windows of his office. The building was mostly offices and surveillance rooms, but in the basement levels, Tony had set up an off-the-books R&D center where he was working on “Avengers stuff”.

 

The top floor, though, was Norman’s, and as with every one of his facilities, there were on-site sleeping quarters, should he get a little too into his work.

 

Minutes later, the door opened, and a tall, well-muscled black man stepped inside. According to his file, he was in his mid-twenties, though he had one of those ageless faces that would probably look young well into his thirties. He was currently wearing civilian attire, well-fitted jeans, clean loafers, and a black shirt with a suede jacket open over it.

 

“Colonel Rhodes,” Norman said, holding out a hand to shake. James immediately took it and gave it a firm shake.

 

“Retired,” he said. “Call me James.”

 

“Good to have someone with some real combat experience,” Norman said, gesturing at a seat. “I assume you’ve been briefed on what we’re doing here?”

 

“Minimally, sir,” James said, taking the seat while Norman sat opposite him. “I understand there’s something really big going on and it has to do with an international terrorist group.”

 

“Hydra,” Norman said. “They’ve infiltrated SHIELD, and we have reason to believe they’re in other parts of the government as well. The only problem is, if we start attempting to root them out here, we’ll simply spook them. Their motto always was – “

 

“’Cut off one head, two more will take its place’,” James said. “I did a report in high school.”

 

“So, we’re going after the body,” Norman continued. “We believe they’re operating out of a small European nation known as Latveria. Heard of it?”

 

“Not really,” James admitted.

 

“Most people haven’t,” Norman told him. “That’s likely why Hydra is based there. Off the grid, out of most of the public’s awareness.”

 

“And you mean to take the fight to them?” James asked. “How so?”

 

“Suits,” a voice said from the doorway, and they both turned to see Tony standing there with a smirk. “Suits of armor for everyone. It’s like Oprah. You get armor, you get armor. Tax nightmare that was, though. Most people couldn’t afford to actually _keep_ the cars, PR disaster.”

 

“Tony,” James said, standing and turning to face him. Norman just watched, curious how these two knew each other.

 

“Rhodey,” Tony said back, striding toward him and holding out his hand, which James took and gave a firm shake, pulling him in and patting him on the back in a little one-armed hug.

 

“Damn good to see you again,” he said, pulling away and looking Tony up and down. “How you been? You dropped off the map, and then I heard you took up with Oscorp.”

 

“I needed some time,” Tony told him. “Kinda…sort things out. Sometimes, all you can do is let the breakdown happen and build it back up.”

 

“Well, you’ve built something better than you ever had,” James said with a grin. “Hey…you should call Pepper. She was worried about you.”

 

“We’ll see,” he said, gesturing back to Norman. “In the meantime, suits, as I was saying. I think you probably heard about the little disagreement we had with the Arms Committee? Senator Stern, who is…very stern. Well-named, actually.”

 

“I heard about that,” James said. “I couldn’t even believe it. You were the military’s golden boy for years.”

 

“But not Hydra’s,” Norman added. “We think Senator Stern is affiliated with them and has been sabotaging the military’s defenses with cheap cannon-fodder designed by Hammer Industries or Stane Enterprises.”

 

“So we’re gonna go to Latveria and find them?” James said, and Norman nodded.

 

“We’re still assembling the full team, though,” he said. “We have a few other prospective members, but none of them have much in the way of formal training. You, however, have seen battle, commanded brigades, and proven yourself more than once to be cool under pressure. We would like you to be our Iron Patriot.”

 

“Sort of a new-generation Captain America,” Tony said. “You’ll lead the field ops, strategize, all that jazz. It’ll be fun.”

 

“I’m sure,” James said sarcastically, looking over to Norman. “It would be an honor to lead your team. Sign me up.”

 

“Perfect,” Norman said with a nod. “In that case, welcome to the Avengers. Tony, why don’t you show him the armor?”  


“Shall we?” Tony said, gesturing toward the door. As they left, Norman spun his seat out to look over the city once more. It was a solid start, but to take on the most nefarious terrorist group in the world, led by a man that even had even given Captain America a run for his money in sheer strength and tenacity, they would need more than some fancy armor.

 

They would need something…uncanny.

 

……

 

When’s the last time you’ve woken up and just been utterly disoriented?

 

Like, I went to sleep next to Gwen in my nice comfy bed in my basement bedroom, a fan buzzing away in the corner, and I’m basically waking up to utter silence and…well, no blankets _or_ Gwen, which is not fun.

 

Also, I’m in some kind of hospital room right out of a horror movie, and I have needles in me, connected to IVs and monitors. Ew. Those were definitely not there when I went to sleep. Did I have some kind of episode while I was sleeping and get taken to a hospital overnight? I think I would at least _kind of_ remember something like that. The only thing I recall is a very vivid dream of sorts and…a voice calling my name, but not just like I could hear it, like I could _feel_ it in my entire being.

 

It was like being adrift in the ocean and suddenly having a lifesaver ring thrown at you to pull you ashore.

 

I sit up from the thin cot I’m lying on and slowly start to tug the needles and whatnot out of me.

 

Hey, if I’m awake and aware enough to be…well awake and aware, do I really need them?

 

Wait…something feels…off…. I feel two significant…swells where I used to have simple pectoral muscles. That’s…odd. Finished removing all of the unpleasant poky things from me, I give these new developments a small inspection. Did I put on weight or –

 

I have breasts.

 

Tits.

 

Boobs.

 

Knockers.

 

Mammaries.

 

Wow.

 

Okay. Okay, Pete, calm down. Deep breaths, and don’t pay attention to how said deep breathes make your new flesh pillows sway and wiggle a bit. Let’s just…okay, let’s just make sure…or see if things are different _everywhere_. Just…okay, knees apart, just a look _down there_ , make sure everything’s in….

 

No, no, no, no, what the _fuck_!?

 

I don’t have a…. It’s _gone_ , or…well, it’s been replaced, but….

 

I did _not_ have one of those when I went to sleep!

 

Deep breaths.

 

Okay, this is just every kind of weird, and I don’t know what happened, but I need to get out of wherever this place is and find out _how_ I’ve suddenly been completely and totally changed into a girl.

 

And why.

 

Because I can’t think of any reason this change was necessary! I certainly don’t have any kind of like gender dysphoria or tumblr-related pronoun issue. I was most definitely _very_ okay with being a guy when I went to sleep and I would be _just as_ fine with being a guy _right now_. Please?

 

Let’s take a peek…nope, still a girl.

 

Oh, this just feels _uncomfortable_. I’m getting distracted by my _own naked body_. I sit up, fighting off a small wave of dizziness, and stand. My neck tingles, and I shiver when I feel a tickle on my shoulders. I whip my head around to see if something’s behind me, getting more tickles. Reaching up, my hands find long, thick brown hair hanging down to my shoulders, the same shade it was when I was a guy but much longer and voluminous, like Kitty Pryde’s but straighter.

 

Okay, focus, Pete. We’ll have a full-on breakdown _after_ we get out of this place. Because if the concrete floors and cinderblock walls are any indication, I’m somewhere with a very real possibility of being dangerous.

 

Also, that would just be my luck, right?

 

A cursory glance of the room reveals a selection of lab coats hanging near the door, and a few cabinets that don’t have anything but tools. Well, a lab coat a few sizes too big is better than nothing, at least. I make my way over, trying to ignore how unsettling something as simple as walking is when my body is not at all how I remember it being. I slide my arms into the coat, buttoning it up and pulling my newly long hair through the collar to let it fall over my shoulders again. I have to roll the sleeves back for my new dainty little hands to be seen, and the coat almost scrapes the floor with how long it is.

 

At least I’m covered. And the fabric is…not terribly itchy.

 

Okay, let’s get out of this place.

 

I try the door, finding it locked, but it unlocks with a click when I turn the knob. I pull it open, finding it thick and heavy, and step out into a long, dimly lit hallway. The floor is the same concrete, the walls still bleak, gray cinderblock, and the lights along the wall were obviously added well after whatever this place is was originally built. The minimalistic sockets are bolted to the wall, bare bulbs screwed into them, with wires hanging against the wall connecting them. The bulbs have protective metal cages overtop of them, casting disconcerting angular shadows along the hall that only add to the oppressively creepy atmosphere.

 

It's like being in one of those indie horror games Harry was way into last year.

 

Okay, stairs? Elevator? Anything? I pick a direction and pad silently down the hallway, the cold concrete stinging my feet. My breath mists before me as I move along, and a shivery chill travels up my spine. It really is brisk down here. I find a door and take a deep breath, placing my hand on the cold brass handle and twisting. No spider-sense, so either it’s not working in this new body or the room is safe.

 

The door creaks open, and I gasp at what I see.

 

Along the wall, seven huge tanks are arranged in a row, connected to a huge computer console. The opposite wall carries an enormous screen, currently displaying an assortment of error messages and windows full of code, with words like “{nutrient array}” and “molec.growth.accel.exe” and a lot of stuff that would take hours to decode.

 

The tanks themselves are in various states of disrepair. Two are open and empty, and one is filled with clouded red liquid, but I think I see the skeleton of a hand brush against the glass, so I’m not inclined at all to check out what’s inside. The other four are broken open, shards of glass littering the floor, which is slicky with liquid residue that obviously drained out through a grate in the middle of the floor. The bottoms of the broken tanks still contain small pools of the red liquid, but no way am I getting anywhere near it; this whole room gives me the willies.

 

Okay, there’s nothing in this room for me. Why would what appears to be some spooky Star Wars lab have clothes in it? Or some sort of pamphlet explaining this latest kidnap excursion along with a bulleted list detailing how I came to be in a spider-powered girl body?

 

That would be helpful.

 

I step back out, freezing when I hear a shuffling sound in the distance, followed by a grunting, growling noise that echoes down the hallway.

 

“Does she wake?” a familiar-sounding voice hisses. I can almost kind of recognize it, but not quite. I just…know I’ve heard it before. “Does she wake, does she walk, does she work, does she…lurk?”

 

Oh, great. Smeagol’s hanging around here somewhere. If he starts chattering on about hobbitses, I’m out of here.

 

Well, I’m out of here anyway, but I suppose I’ll just get out faster?

 

Okay, Pete, find an exit and preferably one that’s not in the direction of Gollum over there. I continue down the hallway and try to ignore the frantic scraping noises echoing from behind me, like nails scrabbling at rock and teeth grinding together. Another guttural growl sounds, followed by a hacking cough that sounds like it’s supposed to be a bark.

 

“Ngack! Footsteps echo soft and sweet, a snack for me to catch and eat? Preying ‘pon the fakes and lies, none escape my prying eyes. The guardian will watch this tower; none resist my awesome power.”

 

Great use of iambic pentameter, pal, but Shakespeare did it better. Still, the voice is getting closer, so I pick up the pace, rounding a corner to see…another long hallway, though this one isn’t lit with those caged lights, so it’s pitch black. My enhanced eyesight can see well enough at night, but there needs to be _some_ kind of light to work with. I turn back to head the other way and stop, freezing up when I see a figure at the other end of the hallway I just came from.

 

He’s tall, with ragged clothes and a bushy mane of hair that’s too matted and dirty to tell the color. He’s standing hunched with his arms hanging in front of him like a gorilla, and as I watch, he crouches in a manner not unlike the one Gwen and I adopt while out on patrol, what we’ve taken to call our “spider stance”.

 

It’s unnerving to see someone else do it, though that might have something to do with the fact that this guy looks like a serial killer and talks like a ring-obsessed troglodyte.

 

“She wakes and walks, she works and lurks,” he says, his voice trembling as he slowly crawls forward, climbing onto the wall and then the ceiling, his hair and clothes hanging down and swaying as he moves.

 

This just went from unnerving to terrifying. He has spider powers, too.

 

“W-who are you?” I ask, and my voice sounds…off, like it used to before I hit puberty and people would mistake me for a…a girl.

 

Well, I guess that makes sense.

 

“I’m and you and you are me,” he says, crawling ever closer. “We’re not ‘we’ but ‘I’. A single strand, a single totem, split and frayed, taken and used, left and forgotten.”

 

He crawls into the light, and I see that his hands are caked in dried blood, his face smeared with it. His face, which looks…familiar beneath the grime and dirt. Glowing from beneath the shadows, two baby-blue eyes peer at me, wide and gleaming manically.

 

That face…wait…. That’s the face I’ve been looking at in the mirror every morning for as long as I can remember.

 

That’s _my_ face!

 

“How…?” I shake my head, taking a step back. “You…you took my body?”

 

He cackles, his whole body trembling and shifting, like a cat ready to pounce. He prowls left to right, clinging to the ceiling the whole while.

 

“A single strand, split and frayed, but all can surely be remade,” he growls. “Patched, fixed, sewn…consumed….”

 

He bares his teeth, and I’ve never seen a set of human teeth look so dangerous, smeared with blood and frothing with saliva that streams up his face as it hangs upside-down above me. Those eyes, _my_ eyes widen, the pupils growing huge before he lunges.

 

The only thing that saves me is pure adrenaline, as whoever this guy is, he doesn’t trigger my spider-sense. Maybe it’s been nullified? I clearly still have some kind of power, because I move just as fast at him, faster even, thanks to my lighter frame. I leap back, ducking under a wild lunge and planting a punch firmly in his stomach, which sends him flying but leaves my hand twinging painfully.

 

He’s got tough skin, tougher than Max Gargan’s even.

 

The body-snatcher sails into a wall, crashing through it, and I quickly decide that sticking around for a fight would be foolish. This guy definitely gave my body some kind of upgrade, and I’ve already almost broken my fingers punching him. I hurry down the hallway, following the lights. Clearly, the big fella back there retrofitted some kind of old asylum or something for whatever demented purposes he had in mind (like body-snatching and gender-swapping or something), but that should make it easy to find a way out. All I have to do is follow the functional technology.

 

Success! A cement stairwell greets me at the end of the hallway, lit intermittently by more caged lights.

 

“Why does she fight it?” crazy-boy back there hisses, and I see those piercingly blue eyes glaring back at me. “The pull, the stress, the tear, the mess. Let ‘us’ become ‘I’, ‘we’ become ‘him’. Jam spread over too much toast, a thousand bodies, a single ghost.”

 

“And I thought _my_ poetry sucked,” I mutter, hurrying up the stairs, and I hear the sound of him giving chase. I leap onto the wall, glad that still works, and skip the stairs entirely, jumping from wall to wall. I’m probably flashing him a view of my new lady parts, but he doesn’t really seem the type to care about such things.

 

I hear him chanting his inane poetry the entire climb, but I don’t have time to try to make out the words or look for deep meaning in his heartfelt prose. From the sound of things, he fully intends to go Hannibal Lecter on me when he catches me.

 

And let’s face it, I’m no Jaimie Lee Curtis.

 

My heart hammers, and a few times, I feel his claws just grazing at my feet, hear the guttural grunt of him lunging toward me, his voice, which sounds like mine when I hear it in a recording or something, snarling and yelling his slam poetry at me. Still I continue leaping, counting on the fact that I’m smaller and lighter now to carry me further ahead. Faster, faster, Pete.

 

Ugh, I’m…bouncing. I should have tied these things down or something.

 

How fucking high is this staircase?

 

Just when I’m considering stopping and giving him a few good punches in that poetry-spouting mouth of mine, I see a doorway and leap through it, emerging into another hallway and dashing along it, seeing daylight in the distance.

 

I never thought sunlight could look so welcoming.

 

The light is unimaginably bright as I get closer, and I find myself squinting as I near it, but if I stop, it’s back to poetry hour with Smeagol, so I forge ahead, hearing him snarling as he emerges from the staircase behind me.

 

C’mon, Pete, no time to worry about bouncy bits, just get outside and…improvise.

 

That’s usually how it ends up, at least.

 

I burst through the door into a light almost too bright for my eyes to handle, but I can’t worry about that right now. I feel my way blindly forward, reaching another wall, and a shadow falls over me, allowing me to look around. I seem to be standing in the shade of some tower, and nearby is a slightly familiar building….

 

My thoughts are interrupted by a screeching snarling sound from the door I just emerged from, and I turn to see my pursuer shrinking away from the sunlight, yanking the door shut and presumably running back to his pit.

 

Apparently, he just can’t handle sunlight.

 

Well, there goes my body. Not that I have any idea how I’d get it back anyway.

 

“Okay,” I say, still slightly unnerved by my feminine voice.

 

And body.

 

“Okay, Pete,” I say again, my hands shaking as I take a moment to collect myself. “Let’s just…find out where you are.”

 

It doesn’t take long for me to recognize the place, especially after I crawl up the nearest wall and survey the place from the roof. A stone facility surrounded on all sides by a seemingly endless sea of trees, and cutting through the foliage, a single winding path leading away.

 

This is the same place the Superior Six spirited me away to a couple months ago.

 

Did they do it again? I didn’t see any of them down there. Why stuff my brain into a girl’s body and turn my original self into some kind of morlock that speaks in bad poetry?

 

Petty revenge? For science? The lulz?

 

All of the above?

 

I spy a small dirt lot that I didn’t see before and hurry over, gasping in relief when I see a car parked there. I almost jump over the side and web off the taller tower nearby, but seconds before I’m ready to leap, I remember that I don’t have my web-shooters.

 

Close one.

 

I crawl carefully down the side of the building and jump when I’m sure I’m low enough, thankful that I don’t have an audience to flash my new lady-bits to as the lab coat furls around my legs. I hurry toward the car, stopping in my tracks when I see a figure lying prone on the ground nearby, a pool of dried blood around him.

 

My head swims, and I have to shake myself as my hands turn clammy, wiping them on the coat. I’ve never seen a dead body before, but this guy definitely is. Flies are buzzing around him, and as I near him, a pungent odor of decay washes over me, making me gag. I quickly hurry past, but a sick curiosity compels me to look, seeing a familiar bearded face, one that’s usually pulled into a sneer, at least when he’s looking at me or socking me in the jaw.

 

“Max Gargan,” I breathe. He’s paler, his face frozen in an expression of terror, the skin already waxy and sunken. He’s been dead for a while, then. Flies are buzzing around an open wound on his throat that looks deep, almost to the bone.

 

Stop _looking_ at it, Peter Parker!

 

Tearing my eyes away, I move closer to the car, jumping when I step on something near it, the car giving a quiet honk that makes me jump even more.

 

Calm down, Pete. You’re Spider-Man. You can handle yourself.

 

Of course, the fact that about a hundred feet below me, my body crawls around the halls of some spooky underground lab, possessed by a Tolkien character, is constantly nagging at the back of my skull, as well as the desire to get away from this place as quickly as possible.

 

To that end, I check under my foot and find a key, presumably to the car, which is pretty spiffy, actually. I’m no car guy, but the Dodge logo on the front says enough, as well as the word _Avenger_ along the trunk. It’s a coal gray color and in good condition except for a bit of dirt buildup from driving out here, most likely.

 

Pressing a button on the key fob, I pop the trunk, taking a cursory look around it and finding a duffel bag. I quickly open it up and find a supply of clothes, glorious clothes. Of course, they’re Max Gargan’s so they’re about a hundred sizes too big, especially on my new slimmer girly frame.

 

Stop looking at your tits, Peter.

 

I pull a tank top on, thankful that Max seemed to favor skintight clothes to show off his muscles, and then a Guns and Roses t-shirt.

 

At least he had decent taste in music.

 

The lower body is a bit of a problem, but with a bit of strategic ripping and tying, I fashion myself a kilt (I will _not_ call it a skirt) out of one of his t-shirts and tie it into place.

 

Okay. Now I just look like a girl who raided her dad’s closet for ‘70s Spirit Day at school.

 

I close the trunk, unlocking the car and taking one last look at Max. He was an evil prick, but I almost feel kind of bad for him. This is no way for anyone to die, out in the middle of nowhere like this.

 

Still, I can’t very well take him with me, and I just don’t have the time to give him a proper burial. I need to find help, find some way to maybe get my body back.

 

I’m sure there are a lot of people worried about me, at least.

 

I climb into the car, ponderously turning the key and starting it. In my travels through the internet during hours that would have been better spent in bed, I’ve come across various how-to pages on everything from crochet to scuba-diving. One such page was about driving. So, the _theory_ is floating around there in my head.

 

Brake.

 

Shift into drive.

 

Release brake.

 

Gas- _oh shit!_

 

The car lurches forward, and I slam on the brake moving back over the gas and…tapping it this time. The car rumbles forward at a more reasonable pace, and I circle the building, finding that dirt path and cruising forward, ready to follow it wherever it takes me.

 

Time to get home.


	4. Chapter 4

It’s a long drive from Jersey to New York.

 

I mean, I knew that already, having made the trip by helicopter. _That_ even took a couple hours. Making the same trip overland in a car, even in sparse midweek traffic, is just time-consuming. I’ve been on the road for nearly two hours, stopping only once an hour ago to gas up the car and stock up on snacks and a giant bottle of Mountain Dew that I made short work of. Of course, that ended with a terrifying trip to the women’s room at a convenience store nearby shortly before my shopping trip.

 

Women’s restrooms are disgusting.

 

Now, though, I need a new wardrobe. My improvised outfit is looking less and less like proper attire the closer I get to civilization. To that end, I’m at Sears. And apparently, I’m discomforting some of the staff.

 

“Is…is there anything I can help you with, Miss?”

 

“Hey, actually, yeah,” I say, turning and smiling at the worker. She’s probably Aunt May’s age and has the same kindly air, like all she wants to do is help make as many days better as possible. I could use that right now. “Is there like a hotel or something nearby? Preferably for less than a hundred bucks a night?”

 

“Well, let me think,” she says as she casually straightens the clothes rack I just raided. The car had a huge wad of cash stuffed in the glovebox, and I’m tired of wearing these hand-me-downs. I had to kind of work past the whole “boy in the girls’ clothing department” thing, but given that Gwen has dragged me through the Juniors department on more than a few shopping trips (and openly picked out underwear with a few teasing looks at me), it wasn’t _so_ bad to navigate, especially given that I’m now visibly female myself. I’m still getting funny looks, but it’s more due to the bag-lady attire, I assume.

 

“There’s the Econo Lodge, just about half an hour’s drive that way,” the lady says with a vague gesture outside. “I’d be more than happy to write you some directions when we check you out.”

 

“Yeah, sounds good,” I say, looking down at the cart. I bought about three outfits, including some more form-fitting black exercise wear that should make a decent improvised costume if I need to kick some butt when I get back to New York. Maybe I can find some decent goggles to work as a mask. I don’t know how long I’m going to be like this, so I’d sooner maintain the secret identity.

 

A terrifying but very real possibility is that I’m just stuck like this.

 

But we’re not thinking about that right now, because that’s full-on panic-attack territory.

 

Alright, so I have clothes that will fit better, the promise of directions to a hotel where I can regroup, and some essentials like shampoo and toothpaste and stuff in the trunk of my fancy stolen car. I head to the checkout, and the same clerk rings up my clothes, smiling sweetly as she bags them up and takes my cash. As I’m collecting the bags, she scrawls out a crude map to the nearest hotel on a blank strand of receipt tape, writing down a few directions below.

 

“My brother stayed there just this last Christmas when he stopped in, and he says that they’re not the ritziest place, but they’re clean and not that expensive at all,” she says, sliding the paper across the counter.

 

“Thank you so much,” I say. She pats me on the hand with another warm smile.

 

“Good luck out there, darling,” she says.

 

I head outside into the late morning sun.

 

I pop the trunk on the Avenger, tossing my purchases in and shutting it before sighing and leaning on the car. All I want to do right now is just collapse and take a nap, but I’m hungry and I need a place to collect myself. That place is not the parking lot of a Sears at a strip mall in Somerset, New Jersey. Keep moving, pass out when it’s safe.

 

“Nice car,” a voice with a strong Philly accent says, and I turn to see a group of four guys, all probably college-age but definitely not college students. They’re all wearing variations of the same outfit, jeans, tank tops, baseball shirts, and worn sneakers. The one that just spoke has shaggy black hair and a smile that’s probably supposed to look friendly but just comes off as mocking.

 

“Thanks,” I say. “I stole it from a member of the Superior Six.”

 

They all laugh, and the lead one takes a step closer.

 

“Sounds exciting,” he says. “What’s a girl like you doing out on a school day? Skipper?”

 

Ugh, they’re doing that stupid thing misogynist douchebags do when they see a pretty girl.

 

Is it narcissistic if I think I’m pretty? This is sort of not really my face or body, right?

 

“Felt like doing some shopping,” I say, backing up and heading for the driver door. “Anyway, I’m mid shopping-spree, so time to go.”

 

“Hey, c’mon, don’t be like that,” the guy says, and suddenly, he’s leaning against the door, grinning down at me. “I’m Deric. How ‘bout you tell me your name, and we get to know each other?”

 

Ugh, this just got annoying.

 

“Deric. I’m sure you think you’re super charming or whatever, but I’m am just not in the mood to deal with a wannabe Casanova right now,” I say, glaring up at him. “Please remove yourself from my car door.”

 

“Man, you got some pretty blue eyes,” he says. He reaches up, probably intending to grab at my face, but I smack his hand away.

 

“I am giving you one warning,” I growl at him, enunciating each word. “Remove yourself from my car door.”

 

“Oho, Skipper’s got spunk,” he says, looming over me and reaching out again. This time, I just grab his wrist, yanking him toward me and lifting him over my shoulder and tossing him onto the pavement. “Agh, fuck!”

 

He lands and rolls over a couple of times, crawling quickly away toward his little posse. I turn to them and fix them with the sternest glare I can manage.

 

“Are we gonna do the movie thing where I drop the rest of you, or are you gonna be smart?” I ask.

 

One of them just shuffles forward to help Deric up, and they all hurry away. I roll my eyes, opening the door.

 

Skipper, my ass.

 

I start the car and get back onto the highway, following it toward the hotel the nice Sears lady told me about. Driving’s much easier now that I’ve been doing it for upwards of two hours. It’s all about gauging the car’s reactions to what you do and repeating those as needed. It’s actually not too different from web-swinging in the amount of attention it requires. In fact, I can even let my thoughts drift once in a while, which is unnerving, because they usually drift to just how messed up this whole situation is.

 

I meticulously checked the news, but there’s no alert out for anyone named Peter Parker, either missing or otherwise. Everything seems fairly normal, other than a bit of stormy weather headed toward New York, but even that’s just…the weather. I expected something about me being kidnapped.

 

Again.

 

Some small part of me is arrogantly disappointed that Tony Stark hasn’t launched a statewide search. Unless he has and is keeping it discreet? It wouldn’t do much good anyway; they’ll be looking for Peter Parker the boy, not….

 

Patty Parker?

 

Great, I’m a fifty-something young grandma that posts Minion memes on Facebook and ends every online correspondence with “lol!”.

 

Something younger-sounding, like…. Penny?

 

Nah, I’m not a Penny.

 

Something in the family? My first instinct is to go with my mom’s name, Mary, but when I think of the concept of “Mom”, it’s always Aunt May. Oh! Aunt May’s maiden name is Reilly. I could go with that. It’s a first name, too, and pleasingly gender-neutral.

 

So, Reilly, and maybe we can use Uncle Ben for the last name, like…Reilly Benjamin? That doesn’t really roll off the tongue.

 

Reilly Benson? Maybe go with the simpler spelling of Riley.

 

So…Riley Benson.

 

Yeah.

 

It’s a good…alias.

 

Because I’m still totally Peter Parker. I’m just having one of the worst days of my life. Like…definitely in the top five worst days.

 

Or is that the bottom five?

 

Focus, Peter.

 

Or is it Riley? Do I use my alias in my head?

 

I peek over at the written instructions and take my exit, driving through a small urban area that could be generously described as quaint. Still, it has all the amenities, a Walmart, a few small restaurants….

 

Arby’s!

 

I glance at my rearview before changing lanes and turning off the road, pulling into the restaurant that has carried me through some of the toughest times of my life. The home of good mood food. The place that has the meat.

 

Okay, I’m making a big deal out of a fast food place, but I’ll take any excuse I can to feel the slightest bit positive. I almost park and head for the dining area, but I’m still wearing this improvised outfit and am, to say so myself, in dire need of a shower. So rather than impose my grimy new female self on the clientele, I head for the drive-thru. After passing a fifty to a very bemused (and somewhat surly) drive-thru worker lady, I accept my three French dip and Swisses, two loaded curly fries, four chocolate turnovers, and an order of mozzarella sticks for the road.

 

I’m _hungry_.

 

I settle my food on the passenger seat and set back out, taking a bite of a mozzarella stick and following the directions to the Econo Lodge, a small hotel or…motel. I’m not entirely sure what the difference is. I park and climb from the car, shutting the door with a solid clunk and using the key remote to lock the car with a muted honk as I head for the lobby.

 

The sliding doors part, and I step inside, inhaling that unidentifiable “hotel smell” that seems to permeate hotel lobbies nationwide. The guy behind the counter takes one look at me, betraying little more than a bemused raise of the eyebrows.

 

At least he’s professional.

 

“Um…welcome to the Econo Lodge,” he says. “Do you have a reservation?”

 

“No, I’m actually just looking for a room for like…the shortest amount of time possible,” I say, shrugging. “Like…I seriously only need like a few hours.”

 

He smiles, chuckling a bit.

 

“Well, I’m sorry, but the shortest I can give you is one day. Sorry about that.”

 

“No, it’s fine,” I say with a shake of my head. “Um…so, I’ll just do that.”

 

“Alright, that’ll be…seventy even,” he says, tapping the touchscreen computer he has on his counter. I nod, presenting the hundred I totally didn’t have tucked in my shirt. That would just be cliché and actually pretty inappropriate and rather convenient now that I get to use the boob-wallet myself. He takes the payment with a small laugh, tapping a few more options, and I hear the clank of a cash till opening behind the counter. He shuffles around for a moment, handing me a key.

 

“You’re room seventeen, just on the second floor,” he says. “Do you need help with your bags?”

 

“Nah, I got ‘em,” I say, taking the key. “Thanks a bunch.”

 

“Enjoy your stay,” he says.

 

I head outside, gathering up my purchases from the car and the three bags of Arby’s, carrying them laboriously to the lobby again before just plopping them all onto a luggage cart. Towing that, I head for the elevator, slumping against the side as I punch the button for the second floor.

 

I need a shower.

 

……

 

“Seriously, it’s raining?” Jess asked as she and Jennifer made their way down the hall. It was Friday, the end of the school day, and the mood among the students was obviously boisterous despite the weather. “Wasn’t it snowing like sixteen hours ago?”

 

“You’ve been in Ohio for months, and you’re still surprised about the weather?” Jennifer quipped. “That’s about the only interesting thing about this state.”

 

“And the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, and the fact that Toledo is the human trafficking capital of the world,” Jess said in a long-suffering voice, and Jen just stuck her tongue out at her. Jennifer was Jess’s only friend in Ohio. A short, squat girl with a bob of ginger hair, she had a kindly smile and a refreshingly unbiased opinion about her home state.

 

“At least you remember the selling points,” she said, stopping at her locker and inputting her combination. She stuffed her Science book in and slammed it shut, following Jess to her locker and waiting as she withdrew her Social Sciences book. The pair made their way toward the exit, Jess groaning as she spotted a tall, broad figure approaching.

 

“Don’t say my name, don’t say my name, don’t – “

 

“Jess!”

 

“Fuck….”

 

She turned and saw Billy Preston making his way over. Tall and heavyset, Billy was nonetheless muscular, as his membership to the wrestling team would attest, and he seemed to have taken Jess on as some sort of challenge. From day one, he seemed to think that the very virtue of his existence entitled him to his pick of the girls at Walkerton High, and his pick was apparently Jess.

 

Jess was less than accommodating.

 

“Billy,” she said, turning and fixing him with the most sincere smile she could manage.

 

It wasn’t very sincere.

 

“Hey, so I’m having a party out at the barn tonight and – “

 

“I have plans,” Jess smoothly overrode him, not pausing in her stride toward the doors. Billy followed, his heavy boots clunking on the floor. Ugh, he was wearing camo pants today; who was he hiding from? Jess wished he would hide from _her_ from time to time.

 

“C’mon, why you gotta be like that?” Billy said. “Come along, it’ll be fun.”

 

“Billy, the last time I went to one of your little parties, half the school showed up and got trashed,” Jess said.

 

“Yeah, it was the shit,” Billy chuckled, and Jess shook her head, stepping outside.

 

“I’m just not into the party scene anymore, Billy,” she said, eyes panning over the crowd outside. Mom usually didn’t make it right at the end of the school day, but sometimes she headed up early and took Jess and Phil to Pizza Hut on Fridays. That would be about the only thing that made today –

 

Oh.

 

“Oh,” Jess gasped, ignoring Billy’s claim about how this party was going to be different. She had just spotted the most beautiful set of baby blue eyes, framed between a mop of brown hair. Peter Parker was there on the sidewalk, Gwen Stacy next to him and MJ off to the side. “Peter.”

 

“Peter?” Jen asked from next to her. “ _The_ Peter?”

 

“Peter!” Jess squeaked, hurrying forward through the throngs of students. It felt like one of those scenes in a John Hughes movie, the classic 80s trope where the crowd was parting around her and her beloved. Pete grinned at the sight of her, and then he was hugging her as Jess threw herself at him. He lifted her and spun her in a circle, settling her back on her feet. Thankfully, he didn’t let go, and neither did Jess, clinging to him, ready to sob from relief. He was here. He was right here in front of her, holding her and hugging her.

 

“Hey, Jess,” he said, and she nearly burst into tears at the sound of his voice, so clear, so…present.

 

“Hey, Pete.”

 

……

 

Showering as a girl is just a whole mix-bag of feelings I didn’t know I would never be prepared to deal with. I mean, first question, where is all of this hair coming from? Am I shedding? Is this a girl thing? I suppose I’ll have to ask Gwen when I get back to the city.

 

Second, what’s the rule with finding myself attractive? I thought briefly about it in the parking lot, but being in a shower with my own naked (female) body is just…icky in new and strange ways. Running the washcloth over certain parts of my anatomy is making feel like I have to call Gwen and apologize profusely for cheating on her or something.

 

Third, I’ve used _so much shampoo_. First order of business when I get back is a haircut. Or…well, second. If I find out I’m going to be spending a lot of time in this body.

 

Let’s hope not.

 

I step out into the chilly air of my hotel room, which is nice for the money, and I make my way over to the bed, attempting to towel my hair dry because I never figured out the whole towel turban thing that girls use to dry their hair. Settling on my bed in just a towel, I peer at the TV screen, taking in an afternoon news report while I attempt to wring my hair out into another towel.

 

“ _…update on the report from Midtown High School, where it seems the first mutant in months has awoken to his powers. The identities of the students involved are being withheld, but Channel Four News can confirm that there has been one confirmed hospitalization as a result of the incident. The student in question is in reportedly stable condition after an unintentional attack by his fellow student, an attack that some say was only stopped by the timely intervention of the Black Widow. This has fueled speculation that the Black Widow and her fellow members of the Spider-Trio may in fact be students at Midtown High School_.”

 

Great. That one’s gonna take a while to blow over. I can’t fault Gwen for being concerned enough to jump right into the fray when my wellbeing is at stake, but rumors were already flying at school in the past week, according the MJ, and with this news report, they’re only going to intensify. Hopefully I can start running interference when I get back from my little “hospital stay”.

 

If I can get my body back to normal.

 

Ugh, it’s just craziness piled on top of craziness.

 

Still, there’s a continued lack of any sort of news coverage of my disappearance. To that end, I reach into the shopping bag I got from the Circle Q I gassed up and pull out another purchase, a prepaid phone and airtime card.

 

I’m getting to the bottom of this if it’s the last thing I do.

 

It takes about fifteen minutes to get the phone itself set up with the assistance of my hotel room’s phone and some nice fellow named Andy with SureTalk. Gwen, Harry, and I once agreed that Facebook would be our public face, the method of social networking that we use to keep the masses convinced that we’re nothing more than a trio of ordinary if eccentric teenagers. So it’s no surprise when I download the Facebook app and open it up to see Gwen has recently posted a status saying that she’s just visited me in the hospital and…. I’m awake?

 

_‘Just visited Peter Parker at the hospital and he’s awake! He’s feeling okay but a little achey, but if anyone wants to talk to him, feel free to message him or text him your well-wishings!’_

 

That’s an odd thing to post six hours after my disappearance. I don’t think Gwen even knows my Facebook login information to pose as me, and really, if you don’t want to call attention to it, why go to such lengths to…do exactly that?

 

I tap my icon and load my Facebook page. The first thing that greets me is a status I don’t remember posting. The last one I posted was hours before getting zapped by Flash, lamenting that it was only Tuesday and not closer to Friday. It was agreed that it would be best to hold off on social media for a few days, play up being in a coma or something and just let people cope with Flash Thompson’s newly-discovered mutanthood without thinking about Peter Parker. My first post would be…well, today, after arriving in Ohio and surprising Jess. The status I see certainly looks like something I would post.

 

_‘Just woke up, and it’s Friday. Guess I got my wish.’_

 

Short, sweet, just a bit of sarcastic humor, and it doesn’t implicate Flash or set myself up as a victim. Haha, everyone moves on. The only problem is, I didn’t post it, or I don’t remember doing so. About the time my Facebook page was last updated, I was running for my life from Smeagol in the Superior Six’s bunker.

 

Something’s definitely fishy. Why go to all the trouble of setting up a fake wakeup call in the hospital when it would have been so much easier to prolong my “coma” until I was located? Have I been replaced by some body-snatcher? I thought my body was back at that underground lab, shuffling around and spouting demented poetry. Was that some kind of failed attempt at a decoy body? But that begs the question of why someone would go to all the trouble of setting up a fake Peter Parker and dump the real one’s brain in a female body.

 

Wait. I _just_ posted a new status, according to Facebook.

 

_‘Hospital food sucks, TBH. At least I have company.’_

 

Below, I’ve tagged Gwen and MJ, who have both gone on to like the status. It’s a pretty typical exchange for a high-school kid caught in the middle of a mutant emerging in his school. My first instinct is to berate…well, myself…for calling attention to the fact that he’s in the hospital and give the press something to run with, but then I realize that that’s pretty much what _would_ happen in the case of Peter Parker, civilian. Trying _not_ to draw attention to myself would only draw _more_ attention, so playing a normie and reacting to all of this oblivious to the repercussions is probably for the best. People will see it, nod, and move on.

 

I couldn’t have planned it better myself.

 

And that’s even more worrying.

 

……

 

[Jess/Pete in Ohio]

……

 

New York traffic sucks.

 

I manage, through every ounce of patience left in my new female body to make it through the sometimes gridlock traffic to Queens, but I don’t dare brave Manhattan, least of all this close to five o’clock, when all of the first-shifters are let out to flood the streets in a mad rush to get back to the part of their lives the _doesn’t_ suck.

 

No, I’m gonna park in the Arby’s near home, lock up, and hope no one cares about one lone Dodge Avenger. I mean, if they do, it gets towed, and oh no, I’m minus a car I barely have the skill to drive, let alone the legal qualifications.

 

It’s a nice car, though.

 

I make the familiar trek from Arby’s to my house, and as I near it, I expect there to be some kind of police barricade, maybe a squad car or a fancy limo signifying Tony Stark’s presence, perhaps consoling Aunt May and telling him he’s going to do everything in his power to find his missing protégé.

 

It’s a little self-serving, but c’mon, I’ve had a rough day.

 

What I find, though, is my house, looking totally normal for a Tuesday afternoon. This whole day has been an exercise in contrasts, namely my mood to the general mood of the rest of the world. Yeah, okay, people have terrible days all the time while the rest of life just keeps moving along, but I’ve been given a _sudden and very abrupt sex-change_. That’s not the kind of thing you just shrug off, even accounting for the whole c’est la vie thing.

 

Calm down, Pete. Psychological breakdowns are for when you’ve gotten to the bottom of things or at least passed them onto someone else who can handle them. No use having a panic attack now if I’m just going to come out of it awkwardly shrugging off the well-intentioned efforts of anyone that’s happened upon my episode and moving along my not-so-merry way to continue to find out what’s thrown my life into such disarray.

 

While still female.

 

This is still just weird.

 

Of course, the cellar door to my spider-lab is locked, but I have a spare key halfway up the side of the house, in a little hide-a-key that is definitely not accessible by any normal human being. Sure, anyone could be watching this time of the afternoon, but I just don’t care right now. I crawl up and retrieve it, shimmying back down the house and quietly unlocking the cellar door. Aunty May _shouldn’t_ be home right now, but given today’s trend, I’m prepared for the worst case of every scenario.

 

As soon as I silently settle the door back down and lock it from the inside, I quietly slip down into my lab, taking a moment to flop onto my bed and just revel in the fact that I’m somewhere familiar and normal. This has been such a stupid-insane day that I’m happy to grasp at anything besides the insanity that life has fallen to.

 

Still, I can’t relax yet. I _could_ of course, and I have before, just come home and crash and make a few excuses to Aunt May as to why I’m so tired an unrested.

 

But no amount of excuses will explain the fact that I’m suddenly sporting some reproductive organs that were not there twelve hours ago.

 

So, before I explain my mysterious absence to my aunt, I have to get in touch with Tony, who has hopefully already made some excuses on my behalf. Then maybe we can fly back to that lab and get my body and fix whatever fuckery Doc Ock has inflicted on it.

 

Ugh, Gwen’s probably worried sick.

 

That thought gets me sitting up and moving again, heading over to the little hidey-hole in the bottom of my closet where I keep my costume.

 

It’s gone.

 

So is my backpack.

 

In fact, all of my “gear” has been taken, including my web-shooters. Gwen must have taken them so she could give them to me when the found me? Maybe? I sigh, reaching up to the box I keep on the top shelf of my closet. If Tony Stark has taught me one thing (and in fact, he’s taught me _many_ things) it’s to always have a spare.

 

I fit my hands into the spare gloves I made, but just I feared, they’re a little big on my new smaller fingers. That’s…fixable. I slip them off, gripping one by the finger and simply tearing it away, repeating the process with the rest. As I’m doing this, I hear the soft creaking of footsteps upstairs, pausing and glancing up at the ceiling that Gwen insisted on dotting with glow-in-the-dark stars with spirited help from MJ.

 

It does look nice.

 

I hear a muffled voice, and I head for the stairs, pausing at the door upstairs.

 

“…Parker, I called earlier today, but you weren’t open,” Aunt May’s voice says. Did she stay home today? “…Yes, the savings account. I wanted to open one for my nephew. He’s working an internship at Oscorp, and he developed some new body armor of some sort that Tony Stark loved, and would you believe he wrote Peter a check for five-hundred thousand dollars? …Yes, I’m so proud of him. I was just wondering what I needed to bring up there to open it up. …Mhm. Yes, I’d like it to go to his name when he’s eighteen. That boy’ll probably get a scholarship to whatever school he wants, but this’ll be a nice nest-egg, just in case. …Of course. Of course, thank you very much. He’s endorsed it already, so…. Yes, that sounds lovely. Thank, Miss…? Miriam, I’ll make sure to ask for you when I get there? …Of course, thank you very much.”

 

I hear more creaking footsteps, creeping back down the stairs and absorbing this new information.

 

I definitely did _not_ tell Aunt May about that check from Tony before bed last night, having gotten a little absorbed in designing Harry’s armor. I’d planned to tell her this morning and see what she said to do with it, maybe just stick it in the bank for a rainy day. Did Gwen or MJ tell her about it? That seems like something that could have waited until they found me.

 

Something’s just not right about all of this, and it’s making me nervous.

 

I finish modifying my gloves and slide into my improvised costume consisting of black tights and a snug-fitting black exercise shirt. Deciding I need a logo of some kind, I grab my original parkour costume out, ripping the sleeves from the sweater and pulling it over my head. I fix my hair, studying the ski mask of the old costume and then my reflection.

 

The most disconcerting part about this weird body-swap thing is that I still look a _lot_ like me. My face looks like someone took all of the boyish bits and replaced them with girlish ones. My jaw is less angular, more sloped, my eyes are a bit rounder (though not to Lana or Kitty Pryde’s dangerously puppy-dog levels), and my lips are fuller, but other than that, if anyone that knew me took a look at me, they would definitely see Peter Parker…but as a girl.

 

There’s that creeping feeling again, like I’m missing a detail I shouldn’t be. I feel like the first time I ever played Minecraft, knowing nothing about it. There are much bigger things going on than punching trees and dirt, but I just don’t know what it is.

 

Focus, Pete. One step at a time, and the next step is this mask. My hair is definitely not fitting in that, and I just don’t have time to worry about a haircut.

 

_Rrrip!_

 

Desperate times. I rip a small hole, and after some finagling, I managed to pull my hair through into a bushy ponytail that bounces a bit as I grab the goggles I used to wear all over the place and slide them on. Taking a step back, I eye my ensemble. With the skintight clothes and sleeveless hoody over them, along with the mask and goggles, I’m putting off a very 90s grunge vibe that I think Harry would appreciate.

 

Alright, stop gawking at your new thigh gap, Pete, time to go get your old body back.

 

I slip silently out the cellar door and creep to the fence in the backyard, noticing that the bird feeder that MJ took out yesterday hasn’t been replaced yet. I should get Aunt May a new one; with Spring coming in fast, it would be a shame not to have a snack ready for her feathered friends, especially given her penchant for spending hours on the back porch, reading and listening to them chatter away.

 

First, though, let’s get to Tony and find out what the hell’s going on.

 

……

 

It feels nice to be web-swinging again. The wind roaring past me, New York soaring beneath me, the buildings flying by as I speed along, all of it just…calming. Despite all of the insanity that’s been going on today, I can still take solace in the fact that New York is still chugging along around me, the same as ever, a dependable constant.

 

“Help! Someone help, please!”

 

And criminals will keep operating under the delusion that I’m just gonna let them be bad guys without a good guy to stop them.

 

I swing toward the source of the voice and land in a small plaza, looking around and seeing a few dozen people milling around, some of them consoling each other, a few others talking loudly amongst themselves while gesturing in various directions. A woman gasps when she sees me, a relieved smile on her face.

 

“You’re with Spider-Man, aren’t you?” she asks, hurrying forward with a few other people in tow. “Thank God, these…these two men in costumes came running up and just held us all up, took our money, our valuables, and…my wedding ring, you have to get it back! It was my mother-in-law’s, it’s a family heirloom.”

 

“Which way did they go?” I ask, and she points off toward the general direction of downtown. I glance that way and back at them. “Alright, sit tight and call the police.”

 

I dash off and leap into the air, webbing in the direction of the thieves. I can see two figures in the distance, an indiscernible green blob leaping from rooftop to rooftop, and nearby, an equally fuzzy brown shape doing the same. As I near, I make out…costumes. They’re really just wearing some kind of sports mascot costumes, one styled to look like a frog, and the other to look like a toad.

 

Frog and Toad…. They’ve come a long way from children’s books, at least.

 

I sigh, swinging in and webbing them together effortlessly, slinging them up from a building.

 

This is embarrassing, really.

 

“Aaaah, hey, hey, hey, what the – “

 

“Are you fucking kidding me?” I ask, swinging in and perching on a flagpole nearby. “Are you seriously fucking joking? I’ve just had the absolute worst day of my life, and now I get to deal with _more animal-themed supervillains_!? No, you know what? You don’t even get to be supervillains, you’re just criminals – “

 

My spider-sense clangs, and I leap as the toad lashes out at me with the pink tongue of his costume, landing where I was and webbing the mouth shut.

 

“I am _talking_ right now!” I say, webbing their bags from their scrabbling hands and slinging them onto my back. “So, what, you just decided you wanted money, so you’re like, let’s go steal some!? And then, one of you, and I’m thinking it was the frog, because his costume is just…disturbingly detailed, was like, while we’re robbing these people, let’s dress up like a frog and toad, because…animals, I guess! I was bitten by a radioactive spider, and _that’s_ why I picked the theme! I don’t just _really_ like spiders, it’s happenstance! You’re _forcing_ these associations, and enough’s enough! There’s this bandwagon that the Superior Six started, and now it’s just getting out of hand!”

 

“Wow, been holding that one in for a while, have we?” a very familiar voice asks, and I look up, gasping as Jackpot comes crawling over the side of the building on her spider legs.

 

She’s figuring it out! She’s using the legs!

 

“Em…um, Jackpot!”

 

“Looks like someone already hit it,” MJ says, glancing from me to the criminals. “Hey, how do you know my name?”

 

“You…it’s…it’s _me_ ,” I say, realizing she probably has no idea what I’m talking about. “Spidey?”

 

She giggles, canting her head to the side. “Um, I understand you’re a fan, but that one’s taken, hon,” she says. “I love the outfit, though. Very grunge. Widow!”

 

Gwen comes crawling over the side, and I feel the fragile control I was gaining over this whole situation slipping away, like those scenes in movies where someone dropped a neat stack of papers and just finished haphazardly collecting them before someone else bumps into him and sends them flying again.

 

Because right behind Gwen is…Spider-Man. In full costume, lenses blinking as he observes the frog and toad guys.

 

I never realized how intimidating the costume is in third-person.

 

“Oh, did someone beat us to the punch?” Gwen asks. “Hey, that’s…. Spidey, isn’t that…?”

 

“My old costume,” other-me says, and it’s surreal to hear my voice without me actually using it, like the clearest recording of words I don’t remember speaking. “Who are you?”

 

He’s…I’m…speaking to me…. To myself.

 

“I’m…um…. Who are _you_?” I ask. “You’re not….”

 

“Um, hey guys?” another voice chimes in, and I turn to see Johnny floating nearby in his wingsuit. “Maybe we should have this conversation after we handle these guys?”

 

“Yeah, yeah,” Spider-Man says. “Dusk, think you can carry them?”

 

“Sure thing,” he says, and a purple-blue translucent barrier appears around Frog and Toad, floating away with them in tow. “Uh, Spider-Girl, can I have those?”

 

He holds his hand out, and I realize I still have their loot slung over my shoulder. I hastily take the bags and hand them over to him.

 

“Thanks,” he says, and with a rush of exhaust from his suit, he buzzes away. I turn back to see Gwen peering closely at me, having perched on the flagpole.

 

“So, mind coming with us?” she asks. “I think we’re justifiably curious here.”

 

“I…sure,” I say, crawling up the side of the building and climbing onto the roof, but as soon as I plant my feet, my legs give out. All of a sudden, I’m just tired, tired of surprises, tired of whatever the hell is going on that’s resulted in this fucked up out of body experience.

 

Peter Parker is standing in front of me, mask hiding his expression as he looks on my collapsed form. But _I’m_ Peter Parker. Who _is_ this guy? Did someone kidnap me and replace me with this body-double? Why? What kind of crazy twisted-up plan would require such lengths?

 

“Hey, are you alright?” MJ asks, crouching in front of me, a smile visible beneath the cowl she insisted on (“So I can give them my devilishly charming smile as I deliver my line!”) as she studies me. “No need to be nervous. Or…well, no need to be _too_ nervous.”

 

“There kind of is, though,” other-Peter says. “That is definitely my mask and my shirt, and my web-shooters. How did you get those? Who _are_ you?”

 

“I’m…” I try to speak, but there’s something in my throat. I feel a soft tug at my mask, and I don’t even resist as MJ carefully removes it from my ponytail, gasping.

 

“Oh my gosh,” she whispers, and I feel her tilting my chin up, her face swimming a bit, and I blink away warm wetness, feeling it trickle down my cheeks. “Pete, she looks just like you.”

 

“Because I _am_ him,” I insist. “Or…someone kidnapped me, I _swear_. They kidnapped me, and they…they took my brain and stuck it in…in this body, and _my_ body…or…I _thought_ it was…. It was given a _different_ brain, of some kind of…crazy thing, and it chased me out of there.”

 

“I didn’t go anywhere last night,” other-Peter says with a shake of his head, and he pulls his mask off, revealing a very familiar face, looking a little strange as I see it head-on without a mirror, but it’s still definitely my face. “Gwen?”

 

She slides her own mask away, nodding. “I think I would’ve noticed.”

 

“But she seriously looks like she could be your twin sister,” MJ says, looking back down at me. “Wait, you’re…what’s your name?”

 

“Peter,” I insist. “My name is Peter Benjamin Parker. I was born October 22, 2001, to Richard and Mary Parker. They left when I was three, and I lived with Uncle Ben and Aunt May until Uncle Ben died last October.”

 

“Okay, but anyone could know that about Pete,” MJ says. “ _I_ know that, and I’ve only really known him for a few months.”

 

“When I was…or you…when we walked Jess home after she visited that day for the first time, she told you to get Chap-Stick,” I tell…me.

 

“You could’ve read that on my – “

 

“You bought two sticks of cherry Burt’s Bees, a stick of vanilla, one of mango, one pumpkin spice Chap-Stick, two vanilla cupcake Chap-Sticks, and a Blistex, but you were too embarrassed to use the Blistex because it seemed girly.”

 

“Oh,” other-Peter says. “Okay, but – “

 

“When we went to wake up Gwen the next morning and went full Edward Cullen on her, we thought we’d never seen such an…an adorable sight ever before,” I tell him.

 

“Aw, Pete,” Gwen says with a tiny smile, glancing from him to me. “Oh, wait, wow…. You…you’re….”

 

“You…when Tony Stark called us his protégé, it was the proudest we ever felt, and…we just wanted to be able to go home and tell…tell Uncle Ben,” I say, and damn it, I’m crying again. “Because he would’ve loved that.”

 

“Oh, holy shit,” he says softly. “But you…. You’re seriously…. But how?”

 

He’s got that shocked look on his face I know I…we…he gets when we’re just completely blindsided, like the time Norman Osborn revealed he’s the Iron Goblin, or Gwen and I discovered our spider powers for the first time, or when Jess first asked me out.

 

But none of that was me.

 

Because _I’m_ not me.

 

 _He’s_ me, and I’m some kind of…gender-bent cloned made for God-knows-what.

 

There was no convoluted kidnap brain-swap plan. I was just grown in a tank and taken out, but something went wrong, that Smeagol guy busted out, or one of the other clones from those tanks.

 

How many more of us are there?

 

“Hey, are you alright?” a soft voice says, and I look up to see Gwen smiling down at me, my angel on high, as ever. She crouches next to MJ and reaches out, gently gripping my shoulder, and I actually lean in a bit, but she’s not my girlfriend. She’s Peter Parker’s girlfriend.

 

And I’m not Peter Parker.

 

“Gwen, give her a moment,” I hear other-Peter—no, just Peter—say. “That…how did this happen?”

 

“I have no idea,” I say, shaking my head. “I just…I woke up like this, and…. I swear, if I’d know, I would have… I would never have bothered you.”

 

“No, no, it’s not like that,” he insists, and I realize that I really am dealing with…me. I’ve never dealt with my goody two-shoes side from and outside perspective, but it really is annoyingly endearing. “I totally understand. I would’ve done the same thing in your shoes.”

 

“You _are_ in my shoes,” I grumble. “I’m a copy-paste of your brain in a female version of your body.”

 

“It’s like a shitty fan fiction,” we say at the same time, and I look up, managing a little smile. At least he can sympathize. In fact, no one can sympathize with me more.

 

“Look, I know what’s going through your head,” he says. “I mean, I better, right?”

 

“And you’re gonna say something like, ‘Just because you’re just a copy of me doesn’t mean you can’t have a place in our weird little family.’ Because we’re sappy like that.”

 

“And you’ll agree,” he says with a grin. “I mean, I know you’ll say no at first because you don’t like imposing yourself on people, but then you’ll realize that – “

 

“Okay, this is getting trippy,” MJ says. “This is like freaky twin telepathy taken up to eleven. Pete, what’s going on?”

 

“Remember when Doc Ock kidnapped me?” Peter says, and the two girls nod.

 

“You mean the most terrifyingly worst night of my life?” Gwen asks wryly. “Yeah, no, I think I recall it.”

 

“I barely remember it, but he mentioned – “

 

“Samples,” I say, remembering it myself. “He took a blood sample and – “

 

“And cloned us,” I say. “Or…he cloned _you_ and made _me_.”

 

“Us,” he insists, and I snicker. Yeah, I would say the same thing to _my_ clone.

 

“Wait, so this girl is a _clone_ of you?” MJ asks. “But she’s…a girl.”

 

“It’s possible,” Peter says. “If you have the right technology, you can do that sort of thing.”

 

“But why would—well…okay, he’s crazy,” Gwen says. “But still, I mean…this is really tough to believe!”

 

“Well, what other explanation do you have for a random girl showing up in my old costume and who just happens to have intimate knowledge of private thoughts I never shared with anybody,” Peter says. “Oh, and she just happens to look just like me?”

 

“Okay, okay, point taken,” Gwen says, sounding baffled more than anything. “But, I mean…what are we doing with her?”

 

“She’s gonna stay,” Peter says as the two girls turn to him. “At the very least, she wants to go to Tony and figure out exactly what led to her…being.”

 

“So…what are we calling you?” MJ asks, pouting thoughtfully. “What would Peter Parker’s drag name be?” Peter splutters, and I frown over at her.

 

“First of all – “

 

“ – we’re not calling it that,” I finish.

 

He looks at me, and I can almost see the conclusions forming in his head. I have to look away before I see him realizing that I can see him concluding and just setting off some feedback loop.

 

“This _is_ trippy,” he says, and I chuckle, hating that it sounds more like a giggle. “Anyway, you’ve thought of one already. Penny? No, that’s…Riley. Riley Benjamin?”

 

“No, I went with – “

 

“Benson,” he says at the same time as me. “Rolls off the tongue easier.”

 

“Riley Benson?” Gwen asks. “That’s actually kinda perfect.”

 

“Alright, we should go get Johnny,” Peter says, already strolling to the edge of the roof. “A crowd of adoring citizens thanking him for helping them?”

 

“He’s probably in heaven,” I say, laboriously gathering up my hair to push through the hole in my mask. I jump when I feel another set of hands helping me and turn to see Gwen with a little smile.

 

“So, that’s really Peter’s brain in there?” she says with a little smile. “Or, I guess an exact copy?”

 

“Yeah, but…I mean, I don’t wanna make things awkward,” I say, shrugging. “Even though, to me, we were….”

 

“Dating,” she says, staring at me with awestruck eyes. “I’m…still trying to wrap my head around this.”

 

“Um, you’re the not one who woke up in the middle of the New Jersey wilderness in a body the total opposite gender,” I say with a little quirk of the eyebrow. “Wrapping my head around this is like trying to saran wrap an egg yolk.”

 

She giggles, and I’ve missed that sound so much that I find myself sighing a bit. “Does that make you an egghead?” she asks.

 

“My head is perfectly reasonably-shaped,” I insist, placing my hands to my skull. “Gwen Stacy, why must you say such hurtful things?”

 

She laughs, pulling her mask back on. “Well, you’re as much of a doof-head as him,” she says.

 

“Hey, I’m either an egghead or a doof-head,” I insist. “You can’t have egg and doof occupying the same head.”

 

She giggles again, shaking her head. “You really are…him…” she says softly. “Or you’re the same person. You _feel_ the same as him, at least. This really _is_ trippy.” We head for the edge of the roof as well, watching as Peter and MJ make their way to the plaza I came from, and I take a moment to watch the Jackpot armor’s jump-boosters in action. The spider legs crouch and throw her into the air, and with a soft rush and a glow of blue light, she’s carried over the gap between the buildings, skittering along the next rooftop.

 

“No hiccups with the Jackpot armor?” I ask, and she shakes her head.

 

“Pete…you both did good,” she says, her voice warm with affection as she looks over at me. “This has been a pretty crazy day for you, hasn’t it?”

 

“I…I could use a hug, if that’s not – “

 

My words are cut off as she wraps me in a hug, and I sigh, feeling a horrible day’s worth of tension leave as I melt into her arms, hugging her limply back.

 

“Better?” she asks softly in my ear, and I nod, extricating myself.

 

“Yeah,” I say. “Um…I don’t wanna complicate things, though, and I’m…. Well, I remember you mentioned you’re not into girls even a little, so….”

 

“Oh,” she says, realizing what I’m referring to. She’s dating Peter Parker, but there’s two people that remember themselves being Peter Parker now, and one of them is going to have to get “dumped”, so to speak. “I…. Oh my gosh, I’m so sorry. Pete….”

 

“Pete’s waiting for us,” I correct her. “I’m Riley, remember?”

 

“But – “

 

“Gwen,” I tell her. “You know…me. Well, Peter. Would he want to complicate things between you and your boyfriend?”

 

She huffs. “I…ugh, but you’re…I feel bad!” She sighs and hugs me again. “C’mon, let’s go talk to Tony. He can help us sort out…what to do with you. It feels so dismissive to say it that way.”

 

“Well, according to the world, I didn’t exist before this morning,” I say, shrugging and turning to head for the edge of the roof.

 

“Riley,” she says, and I turn to see her moving toward me. She lifts my mask enough to expose my mouth, doing the same with hers and leaning in to kiss me softly on the lips. I relax into the kiss, gripping her tightly before she pulls away with a soft puff of breath. “Lana got a kiss from Peter, so you get one from me.”  


I chuckle…or, alright, I giggle, damn it. “Yeah, but I remember the Lana kiss, so I technically got two.”

 

“Oh, shut up, you pig,” she says with a snort. “Look, we’ll…figure this out, okay? Just because you’re….”

 

“A clone,” I say, and she folds her arms.

 

“Just because you’re a clone doesn’t mean you’re any less…. It doesn’t mean you’re any less. Of anything. So we’ll work this out, understand?”  


I nod, and when I speak, my voice sounds a bit throaty. “Yeah,” I tell her. “Thanks, Gwen.”

 

“I love you,” she says, and I have to hug her again.

 

“I love you, too.”

 

……

 

Tony Stark knew he’d found something special when Peter Parker stumbled into his life.

 

That wasn’t true; actually, he’d thought the kid was just another groupie. Tony was the closest thing the science world had to a rock star, and as such, he tended to attract would-be “science greats” who just wanted to watch him work and claim some small bit of “I was there” credit for his next greatest invention. The only reason he’d humored Parker’s request was because Norman Osborn himself had told Tony that he’d want to at least meet the kid, and Norman Osborn was a difficult man to impress.

 

Plus, it was his birthday, and Tony wasn’t completely heartless.

 

But then Parker had shown an aptitude, an innate knowledge of his inventions, deducing their functions and workings with a simple glance, and after the whole spider-bite fiasco, thrown himself into the realm of invention with gusto. Each time he presented a new device to Tony like a kid showing his prized drawing to his art teacher, Tony was continually impressed. Web-shooters? Taser gloves? Lightweight deployable armor? It wasn’t necessarily groundbreaking, but Tony had to admit that it was impressive. Sometimes, his own designs got a little grandiose, but Parker had a knack for keeping it simple while still delivering on functionality.

 

He'd certainly impressed the king of Wakanda, clinching Oscorp’s first large-scale foreign contract and securing their financial future for quite some time. Norman had been ecstatic, and frankly, Tony was proud of the kid. He’d never been the nurturing type, but Peter wasn’t the type to look for much more than a pat on the shoulder, a “Good job, kid.” He just wanted validation as much as the next guy.

 

Aside from all that, he was just interesting to be around. His burgeoning vigilante career as Spider-Man led him into all sorts of adventures that Tony just loved hearing about and, when he was lucky, participating in. Life as the R&D pillar at a Fortune 500 company got dull sometimes, so when Peter Parker’s penchant for getting involved in everything weird New York had to offer crept into his scope, he relished it.

 

And today, as Curt strolled into the R&D facility on the sixty-first floor at Oscorp and presented him with the lab results informing them that someone and gone and cloned a female version of the kid, he knew that he’d only seen the tip of the weirdness iceberg.

 

“It’s a girl,” Curt said flatly as he passed a sheaf of paper over to Tony.

 

“Fascinating,” Tony said. “So this Octavius kidnaps Parker, takes a blood sample, and clones him.”

 

“Seven copies of him,” Curt said, folding his arms, “if the girl’s story is to be believed.”

 

“Yeah, the weird…Gollum thing crawling around the lab,” Tony said. “We’ve sent a team out?”

 

“Danvers is overseeing an exploratory mission as we speak,” Curt said with a nod, looking over to Tony. “You should talk to her.”

 

“Curt.”

 

“Tony, the woman is in love with you.”

 

“Curt.”

 

“Talk to her,” Curt insisted, and Tony sighed.

 

“Maybe,” he said. “So, besides being a clone of Peter Parker, anything special about this girl?”

 

“Well, she displays the same aberrations as Peter does,” Curt said. “Namely a rapid rate of cellular regeneration and above-average vitals.”

 

“That would be the spider stuff,” Tony said. “That’s it, though?”

 

“If I didn’t know better, I would assume she was just an extremely healthy young woman,” Curt said.

 

“How do you explain that she also has all of Peter Parker’s memories?” Tony asked him. “I’m no biologist, but I didn’t think memories worked that way.”

 

“They don’t,” Curt said flatly. “Either Otto Octavius has access to extremely sophisticated technology that allows him to implant memories into a human brain, or there’s a force at work outside of our comprehension.”

 

“Neither of which is good news,” Tony said. “For the time being, though?”

 

“I’ve performed every test in the book on this girl, and barring deeply-ingrained brainwashing procedures, it would be perfectly safe to release her into Peter’s care,” Curt said.

 

“The problem is, fifteen-year-old girls don’t just pop up out of nowhere without there being some very unsavory explanations behind it,” Tony said, leaning against the console behind him. “Luckily, I have some friends with some very obscure contacts that might be perfect for this.”

 

“You’re going to have SHIELD fabricate an identity for her?” Curt asked, leaning next to him as they watched a live camera feed of the girl who called herself Riley snoozing on a bed in the private clinic that was usually specifically reserved for Norman Osborn and a very select few others.

 

“Oh, no, no, SHIELD is compromised, don’t you know?” Tony asked with a vehement shake of his head. “No, I’m gonna talk to Phil.”

 

……

 

It was good to be home.

 

The familiar doorman paused in his automatic greeting of any guest that wandered into the building, blinking and smiling when he recognized who it was.

 

“Welcome back, Mr. Osborn,” he said with a tip of his hat. “Good to see you, kid.”  


“Thanks, Rayburn,” Harry said. “Good to be back. Dad home?”

 

“You kidding?” he asked. “Haven’t seen Osborn Senior in about a week.” He smirked at Harry’s female companion. “You’re in the clear for now, but I’ll hit the buzzer a few times if he shows up, huh?”

 

“My man,” Harry drawled, grinning as he stepped onto the elevator. “Good looking out, Rayburn. Good seeing you, bud.”

 

“Have a nice night, Mr. Osborn,” he said as the doors closed, leaving the two in solitude. Harry looked down at the girl that had grown so important to him these past three weeks.

 

“Told you,” he said.

 

“Hey, I didn’t doubt you,” she said. “Besides, you think I cared if you were rich? That’s icing on a damn good cake, hon.”

 

He leaned down and kissed her, and she giggled against his lips, pulling away and hugging him. “Good to be home?” she asked, and he nodded.

 

“Road trips are great, but I sorted out what I needed to sort out,” he said. “Besides, I wanna show off my bangin’ new girlfriend to all my friends.”

 

“You sure know how to make a girl feel beautiful,” she snarked as the elevator dinged and deposited them at the familiar Osborn penthouse. She gasped, stepping out and eyeing the huge place with awestruck eyes. “Oh, wow….”

 

“Told ya, babe,” he said, coming up behind her and kissing her ear. “My princess deserves a tower, right?”

 

She giggled and turned in his arms, hugging him. “You are too sweet,” she said. “But I’d be happy even if you just lived in a dinky little apartment in the Bronx.”

 

“You think I don’t know that by now?” he said, grinning at her. “Babe, you don’t have to prove anything to me. This is just me wanting spoil my girl because I know I can.”

 

She bit her lip but smiled at him. “Well, don’t let me stop you,” she said, hunching her shoulders and giving him a coquettish little smirk. “But if you don’t think I’m gonna spoil you right back, you’re very sadly mistaken, Mr. Osborn.”

 

Harry was about to respond, when a voice shouted from down the hallway.

 

“Squirrely!”

 

Harry felt a huge grin blooming on his face as he glanced up and saw Pete standing there in a towel, having probably just gotten out the hot tub. His best friend was sporting an identical smile, looking ecstatic as he hurried over.

 

“Stubby!” Harry said, hurrying forward and wrapping his friend in a hug. “Papa’s _home_!”

 

“You should’ve called!” Peter said, breaking away and clapping his friend on the shoulders. “Fuck, man, I thought we were being burgled and I was gonna have to kick ass to defend the Osborn homefront.”

 

“I’m glad I left such a noble knight to guard the palace,” Harry said. “Shit, son, it is damn good to _see_ you!”

 

He yanked Pete into another hug, and Pete just laughed, hugging him back. “MJ! Gwen! Riley! Get in here!”

 

Riley?

 

Harry looked up to see Gwen emerging from the room, and she gasped when she saw who it was. “Ah! Harry!”

 

She hurried over and leapt against him, hugging him tightly, but she was careful with him, not squeezing him enough to nearly break his ribs like their last hug.

 

“What’s up, girl?” he asked. “Been keeping Pete outta trouble?”

 

“More like getting into trouble _with_ him and pulling his ass out of the fire when I need to,” Gwen giggled, and Harry nodded.

 

“Sounds about right,” he said, looking down the hall to see Mary Jane pulling another girl into the hallway.

 

“C’mon, you know you wanna see him,” Mary Jane could be heard saying, and Harry shot a confused look at Pete, who shrugged.

 

“Um…so, a lot kinda happened in the past day or two that we’re…still trying to process, but…this is Riley.”

 

Riley was…well, she looked like Pete, but as a girl. That was the only way Harry could put it to himself as he watched her walking toward them, looking like she wanted a hug as well but wasn’t sure how to go about it. Instead, she looked past Harry, seeming confused at what she saw. Harry smacked a hand to his forehead.

 

“Shit, right, sorry,” he said, turning to see his companion standing there with a sheepish smile.

 

“No, no,” she said, shaking her head. “It’s fine. You haven’t seen them for a while.”

 

“Nah, I’m a loser,” Harry said, turning back to them. “Guys, um…I met someone while I was out and about, and…she’s really awesome. She was kinda just living on the streets in Beverly Hills, and….”

 

“He asked me for gum,” she said with a smirk. “I had Big League Chew, and he went apeshit over it.”

 

“The most nineties of gums,” Riley said with a giggle, quailing under Harry’s curious look.

 

“Yep,” Harry said proudly, ignoring the overreaction for now. “Anyway, I’m in love, and I kinda didn’t wanna let go, so I took her with me, and now she’s gonna be staying here.”

 

“So, does she have a name?” MJ asked.

 

“Jubilation Lee,” she said. “You can just call me Jubilee, though.”


	5. Chapter 5

This is never going to work.

 

I mean, it might, but if it does, it’ll be a miracle. I guess we’re banking a lot on Aunt May’s ingrained maternal nature kicking in before she asks too many questions.

 

I just hope she doesn’t read too much into the uncanny resemblance between Riley and I.

 

Jeez, who am I kidding? _Everyone_ notices it. Total strangers have stopped us at the mall and gushed over how much we look alike.

 

The doorbell rings, right on time, and I hear Aunt May call from the kitchen.

  
“Peter, would you get that?”

 

“Yes, Aunt May,” I say, giving Gwen a look and mouthing “Here goes nothing” before standing and heading for the entryway. Gwen just gives me a hopeful smile and thumbs-up as I go to open the door to see a rather strikingly tall woman with dark brown hair and bright brown eyes that are almost orange. She’s wearing a crisp jacket and tie and a neat pencil skirt, her hair done in a bun that sits nearly atop her head.

 

“Hello,” she says in a businesslike voice. “You must be Peter. Is your Aunt May home?”

 

“Aunt May, someone for you,” I say, looking behind the woman to see Riley peering at me from the backseat of the fancy Chrysler sedan parked in the drive. She gives me a look that speaks volumes through our weird twin-telepathy.

 

_This is never going to work!_

 

“Oh, hello there,” Aunt May says, drying her hands with a dish towel before slinging it over her shoulder. The smell of lasagna baking in the oven is mouthwatering. Aunt May made it from scratch most of the time, and I specifically requested it this time so Riley could have a home-cooked meal made by Aunt May. I know I’d miss her cooking after a few days, too.

 

“May Parker?” the woman asks, holding her hand out. “I’m Maria Hill, Social Services. I was wondering if I might have a moment of your time.”

 

“If you’re looking for donations, I can’t spare much,” Aunt May says, shaking her hand. “I have my own child to take care of.” She gives me a fond smile, and I grin back.

 

“No, no, it’s nothing like that,” Maria says with small smirk at our antics. “I’m afraid it’s a bit grimmer than that. I’m here with a young lady who’s found herself in need of a home, and after some digging, we found you.”

 

“Me?” Aunt May asks, sounding confused.

 

“Is the name Kaitlyn Benson familiar to you?” Maria asks, and Aunt May shakes her head. “I wouldn’t doubt it. She’s actually the twin sister of Mary Parker, Peter’s late mother.”

 

“Mary had a sister?” Aunt May says with a small gasp. “I never knew.”

 

“We don’t know much, but there was apparently some turmoil in the family shortly before Mary met Richard,” Maria says. “This led to a split that was unfortunately never given the chance to mend due to Mary’s untimely death. Sadly, Kaitlyn herself just passed away recently, leaving her daughter with no other family to turn to.”

 

“Oh, heavens,” Aunt May says, and I almost present Maria Hill an Oscar on the spot for so convincingly delivering lines she was fed mere hours ago. It’s just business for her, as I understand it; she’s one of the finest undercover agents at SHIELD.

 

Using her talents for this sort of errand must be downright insulting.

 

“Would you…like to meet her?” Maria asks, and Aunt May nods.  


“Yes, of course,” she says, her eyes shining. “The poor dear.”

 

Oh, Aunt May and your legendary compassion.

 

Maria looks outside and waves to Riley, who emerges from the car and makes her way demurely up the steps, trying to look as timid and nervous as possible.

 

Or maybe she’s just actually apprehensive about all of this. I would be. Of course, if I would be, then she actually _is_ , since she’s me but in a girl’s body, and even accounting for our slightly different experiences over the last few days, our brains are still mostly in sync and –

 

I’m not getting back into the feedback loop. It’s still too trippy.

 

Riley steps quietly into the house, and Aunt May gasps.

 

“Um…hi,” Riley says with our signature awkward wave, and I get yet another firsthand look at how adorkable I can really be. Is that really what I’ve been putting people through? No wonder like five girls are in love with me.

 

Oh, God, my gender-swapped clone is making me a narcissist.

 

I just genuinely had that thought without a hint of irony!

 

“Hello, Riley dear,” Aunt May says, smiling at her and then glancing over at me. “Goodness, you two could be twins. But then, Peter has always looked a lot like his mother.”

 

“We know this is a lot to ask, especially on such short notice,” Maria says, giving Aunt May a thin smile, “but we thought we’d give her a chance to be with family before we have to resort to sending her to a foster home.”

 

“To live here?” Aunt May asked, placing a hand to her chest. “Oh, my….”

 

I glance back at Gwen, who’s peeking in from the living room. She gives me a significant look, eyes darting between me and Aunt May. Getting the hint, I turn to my aunt.

 

“We…we can afford it, Aunt May,” I tell her. “You said yourself you make good money at Oscorp. And there’s the money from my invention.”

 

“Peter, that’s your college fund,” Aunt May says.

 

“That’s more than enough for any respectable college,” I say.

 

Aunt May sighs. “I just can’t believe Mary had a twin sister,” she says faintly. “It must have been quite a falling-out for her to never even mention this Kaitlyn.”

 

“It went both ways,” Riley chimes in. “Um…Mom never really told me much about…her family. I actually looked you up on the internet, because Mom mentioned a sister named Mary who married some guy named Richard, but not much more. I…saw they were dead, and I almost gave up, but the article said their son would be living with his aunt and uncle, and…well, I called Social Services and basically begged them to bring me here. I’m sorry to bother you out of the blue like this, but…I just wanted to meet you.”

 

There was a moment of silence before Maria chimed in. “If you’d like, Mrs. Parker, we can talk some more in the kitchen?” she suggested. “I know this is a lot to take in, and I’m sure you have a lot of questions.”

 

“That…sounds good, yes,” Aunt May says. “Would you two mind – “

 

“No, not at all,” I hurry to say, and Gwen snorts from the living room.

 

Subtle, Parker.

 

Aunt May and Maria head for the kitchen, Maria’s heels clicking crisply on the hardwood floor as she readies herself to convince my only mildly skeptical aunt that I do in fact have a cousin who has totally existed for longer than four days.

 

I grumble as they leave, but of course she wouldn’t just take this at face value and let this random girl that bears an unnerving resemblance to her nephew into her home without some credentials first. Thankfully, Tony’s contacts, with some help from Phil Coulson, were more than happy to fabricate a fake twin sister for my mother and give her a short but torrid history before her own untimely demise.

 

Riley and I both protested at first, but it was Gwen who convinced us that, given the circumstances, Mary Parker would probably have gladly gone along with such a plan.

 

Heck if Uncle Ben’s stories of my father are to be believed, the whole Parker clan would get a kick out of this.

 

Riley follows me to the living room, slumping onto the couch in front of my laptop and peering at the screen, leaning in and tapping at the touchpad for a moment before she realizes what she’s doing. She glances up at me with a sheepish look, but I just shrug.

 

“Just working on the Silver Surfer design,” I say. “I’d ask for input, but….”

 

“We’d just go through a lot of both of us thinking of something at the same time,” she says. “I guess collaborations are gonna be hard.”

 

Gwen pulls her legs up to sit cross-legged on the couch, leaning against Riley and peering at the screen with her head resting on the other girl’s shoulder. It took some adjustment, but it’s hard to be jealous of your girlfriend getting cuddly with someone else when that someone else is essentially you. Plus, it’s been a rough time for my double.

 

I would hate to have to give up that closeness with Gwen on top of all the convoluted cloning bullshit of the past few days.

 

So, rather than loudly clear my throat or something trite and cliché you would see a possessive boyfriend do on a TV show, I perch on Gwen’s other side and lean back into the sofa, pulling my phone out of my pocket. Gwen glances over and hunches her shoulders.

 

“Um, I was – “

 

“Hey, I’ve had you to myself all morning,” I say, smiling at her, and Riley shoots me a grateful look. I pull my phone out, smirking when I see have five texts from Harry, who has taken spiritedly to the concept of the Silver Surfer.

 

**_From: Ozzy Bear_ **

_[bro, can I have like a lightsaber? Can you do that?]_

_[shit, and like some kind of zero gravity hand thing to make me move shit with my hands like a jedi!]_

_[and a sick-ass kylo ren mask and a robe!]_

_[no wait no robe. Jubilee says it’ll get caught on something]_

_[can I have voice modulator on my mask tho? So I can sound all badass when I talk?]_

**_To: Ozzy Bear_ **

_[that’s all doable, but we’ll have to discuss the lightsaber. I was thinking of giving us all voice modulators anyway.]_

_[Too many people are recognizing us from our voices.]_

**_From: Ozzy Bear_ **

_[thats cuz we never shut up when were fighting haha!]_

**_To: Ozzy Bear_ **

_[tru tho]_

**_From: Ozzy Bear_ **

_[y discuss the saber, tho?]_

**_To: Ozzy Bear_ **

_[because besides the coolness factor, it would be hella dangerous to everyone involved]_

**_From: Ozzy Bear_ **

_[fair enough. I still want force gloves, tho!]_

**_To: Ozzy Bear_ **

_[that’s much more possible]_

 

“What’s he saying?” Gwen asks, flopping over to me and peeking at my phone. “He wants to be like Kylo Ren?”

 

“Casual,” Riley mutters, voicing my thoughts. “Revan is best Jedi.”

 

“I thought you didn’t like Star Wars,” Gwen says, and we both shake our heads.

 

“The movies aren’t great, but the world is awesome,” I say.

 

“The games are where it really shines,” Riley adds.

 

“And the books,” I say. “The Thrawn Trilogy, the Old Republic books….”

 

“Good times at the library when you were off to that summer camp that one time,” Riley says. Gwen just snorts and rolls her eyes.

 

“Great, now you can build off each other’s hype,” she says. She peeks at the screen again. “Can you actually make a lightsaber?”

 

“Theoretically, yes,” I say. “Superheated plasma, magnetic containment, probably need a lens to refract it into a proper shape.”

 

“But it’ll have to stay theory,” Riley says, shaking her head. “Way too many ways it could go wrong in just about every phase of development.”

 

“Designing the emitter alone would require…like an underground lead bunker or something,” I say.

 

“And if we actually managed a stable prototype, suddenly Harry Osborn has a lightsaber,” Riley says. “Without spider-sense or enhanced reflexes like we have, he’s minus at least two limbs in about thirty seconds flat.”

 

“So…thought exercise for now,” I conclude.

 

Gwen’s giggling by the time we finish, having watched our exchange like a tennis match. She smirks and wraps an arm around each of us, pulling us into a hug.

 

“Okay, double geek-out equals adorable overload,” she says. “It’s not even trippy anymore, it’s just cute.”

 

I’m about to respond when we all freeze, hearing the soft creak of approaching footsteps. We all jump apart, Gwen quickly leaning in as Riley taps a few things on the screen. I go back to my phone, and nearby, I hear Gwen clicking the wireless mouse at my laptop.

 

“Glad to see you’re getting along,” Aunt May says as she steps in, smiling at the sight of us.

 

“I’m showing Riley Minecraft,” Gwen says. “She’s never played it.”

 

“I never really got into these survival crafty games,” Riley says convincingly enough that even I believe her for a moment, and Aunt May just shrugs, knowing little of anything about the nuances of the gaming world.

 

“Peter, would you come in here for a moment?” she asks. I nod, standing and following her into the entryway, where she turns to face me with a thoughtful expression, moving to lean against the doorway of the kitchen. Maria stands nearby, at a polite enough distance that she’s not imposing herself on our conversation.

 

“What do you think of her, Peter?” Aunt May asks, and I blink, not really having expected the question. I suppose to Aunt May, a random cousin has just been dropped into my life, and there’s every chance we’re two completely different people. Of course she would want to make sure I’m okay with her staying here. I turn back toward the living room and shrug.

 

“I like her,” I say. “We…have a lot in common.” We have pretty much everything in common, short of a few key areas.

 

“Do you think you would be willing to try having her stay here?” Aunt May asks. “Miss Hill says we can give it a try for a month or so, and nothing has to be made permanent. But the poor dear has no family left except for us.”

 

I grin, shaking my head. “No, I’d be willing to give it a shot,” I say. “She can stay in my old room upstairs.”

 

“I was thinking that, too,” Aunt May says, smiling warmly at me. “So you’re willing to let her stay here?”

 

“Of course,” I say with a nod. “I mean, it’s either that or some foster home, right?”

 

She smiles and steps toward me, wrapping me in a hug. “I’m so proud that you’re being so accommodating,” she says. “Shall we go tell her?”

 

She heads into the living room to tell Riley the good news, and I sigh, glancing back at Maria, who has a wry smile on her face as she watches us.

 

“Oscar-worthy,” I tell her, and she just rolls her eyes.

 

“I’ll be sure to thank you in my acceptance speech,” she says.

 

……

 

After a few signatures and a quick trip from Agent Hill’s car to the bedroom I vacated mere months ago, Riley is as moved in as she can be. Rather than move all of my furniture downstairs to the basement (and probably gouge more than a few holes in the walls on the way), I just bought and assembled some cheap IKEA pieces, leaving Uncle Ben’s handmade furniture in my old bedroom, safe and sound and ready for use. All that’s left now is to get a new mattress for the bedframe, which Aunt May promises to take care of with a few phone calls.

 

“Want any help unpacking?” I ask as Riley digs through the few personal possessions she obtained while on her little road trip. She looks up at me with a little shrug.

 

“I think I can handle it,” she says, smirking. “I know where everything goes, at least.”

 

“I bet we could talk Tony into sending over another set of lab stuff for you,” I tell her. “At the very least, you’re welcome to use mine.”

 

“Knew you’d say that,” she says, giggling. “But…thanks. If we _do_ get two workstations, though, we can like collaborate. Like with Harry’s surfer thing.”

 

“I make the floaty-hand gauntlets, you do the mask?” I say, and she shrugs.

 

“And whoever gets done first does the collapsible armor,” she adds.

 

We fall silent, Riley quietly unpacking her clothes, and I make it a point to find myself very interested in the car key I found in one of her bags while she stuffs her underwear into a drawer.

 

“Would it be weird if I asked - ?”

 

“Nah,” she says, shaking her head. “It’s…it’s a little weird, even now, and I can’t help but feel like I’m crossdressing or something when I put my clothes on. I mean, my mental image of myself is still kind of…a guy, I guess, and it’s still strange looking in a mirror and seeing…well, this. And, obviously stuff works a little differently…you know.”

 

“I could see myself forgetting when going to the bathroom and…yeah….”

 

“Don’t you tell anyone, but I’ve done that twice,” she says, giggling at herself. “Middle of the night, sleepy Peter without a peter anymore.”

 

“Oh God, you were just waiting to make that pun,” I say, and she shrugs.

 

“I work with what I’ve got,” she says, shutting the drawer and sighing as she turns to gaze out at the room. “It’s…nice to be home again. I just wish….”

 

“I know,” I say, nodding. “She seems to really like you, though. I think…maybe she kinda knows on like a subconscious level. She’s picking up all the cues I give out, and she’s responding to them.”

 

Riley snickers. “Well…I know I can’t have what I used to—what _you_ have with Aunt May, not without telling her everything.”

 

“She’d worry herself right into the hospital if we said something,” I say. She nods, and I move over to wrap her in a hug. She giggles softly, squeezing me back.

 

“Hugging yourself is usually more pathetic than this,” she says, and I snort.

 

“Stop reading my mind,” I tell her.

 

“It’s mine, too, we have to share,” she says.

 

“Group hug!” Gwen says from the doorway, running over and hugging us both, making us all stumble a bit with her enthusiasm. “You guys ready to go?”

 

“Go?” Riley asks, looking between us as we part.

 

“Oh, fuck,” I say, slapping my forehead. “Um, welcome-back party at Harry’s. I really thought I’d told you.”

 

She shrugs. “Is that really a good idea for me?” she asks. “I mean, these people don’t know ‘me’.”

 

“Then this’ll be a good time for you to officially meet them as Riley,” Gwen says, taking her hand. “C’mon, it’ll be fun. Flash is coming, and he’s bringing some of his new X-Men friends.”

 

“Yeah, won’t it be fun juggling the fact that we’ve met them several times in costume but they have no idea who we are as our secret identities?” I ask Riley, and she rolls her eyes.

 

“Add that to a dose of ‘I’m a gender-swap clone of this person you’ve met’s secret identity, so you’ve double never met me,’” she says. “Secrets on top of secrets.”

 

“Secret-ception!” Gwen says.

 

“We need to lie deeper,” I say, and we all laugh, heading for the door.

 

“C’mon, let’s web over early so we can change when we get there,” Gwen says.

 

……

 

Phil Coulson was a lot of things for a lot of people. For Nick Fury, he was the guy to go to when anything needed done, often jokingly (and sometimes seriously) referred to as the “Third-in-Command” or “Deputy Deputy Director”. For other agents, he was the bar, the standard they all aspired to be, implacable, dependable, and unshakable. And for these Avengers, he was the rock, though none of them knew or realized it yet. He was the SHIELD presence when SHIELD had to stay away from them, lest Hydra catch wind of what they were doing before they even had their deck fully stacked, keeping them grounded and giving them direction.

 

The lattermost role was the one he was playing most now, but he loved it. It was exciting, and it employed his knack for tactical situations in ways he never thought he would be able to use them. In school, fellow students mocked his penchant for trading card games. Magic, Dungeons and Dragons, Warhammer 40K, anything with stats, numbers, powers, units, he’d played them all, and he’d played them well. When he’d secretly confided this in a then rare conversation with Nick Fury, the Deputy Director had fixed him with a beady eye and just nodded, but from that day on, Fury would “happen” by Coulson’s office more and more often, offhandedly talking about “hypothetical” operations for Coulson’s input, and Coulson would coolly and calmly dissect the operations and present Fury with the cleanest, most efficient route to victory.

 

Two months after these visits began, Coulson had been promoted to Special Ops, and within a month after that, he was Special Ops Supreme Commander, and Nick Fury’s “good eye”.

 

Not bad for a nerd from Chicago.

 

Now, Phil was in a position where he could truly let his tactical prowess shine, dealing with the sorts of superpowered players he’d dealt with all the time in his card games. The stakes were substantially higher, with human lives on the line, but he’d dealt well under pressure before, and he would today.

 

He was roused from his thoughts by a synthesized voice.

 

“ _Agent Coulson, you guests have arrived_.”

 

“Thank you, Jarvis,” he said. “Send them in.”

 

Moments later, his door opened, and Phil stood as his five visitors strode into the office. There were three men and two women, all of them fairly diverse but otherwise normal-looking sorts. Phil knew, however, that each of them was a mutant, and one of them was decidedly more visibly so than his companions. He knew instantly which one it was, as the long-haired blond taking up the rear shifted out of a harness, letting two snow-white wings sprout free from his back.

 

“Agh, hate this thing,” Warren Kenneth Worthington III said, glancing his stunningly blue eyes at Phil. “Hope you don’t mind.”  


“Not at all,” he said, gesturing at the selection of chairs in front of his desk. “Have a seat, if you’d like.”

 

“Pass,” another of the men said, and a quick glance told Phil (who had studied all of their files extensively) that he was the man known as Logan, codename Wolverine, and someone Phil was eagerly looking forward to working with, given his record for tenacious commitment to his objectives. He was a well-built man with dark blue-black hair swept back from his face, and he had a thick set of old-fashioned sideburns.

 

“Fair enough,” Phil said as the two women and the winged man sat, but Logan and another much larger man remained standing. Phil recognized the larger man as Piotr Rasputin, alias Colossus, a tower of muscle with crew-cut black hair and a friendly smile that was at odds with his otherwise intimidating appearance.

 

The two women were Ororo Munroe or Storm, who came personally recommended by T’Challa, one of their primary benefactors, and Anna Carlyle or Rogue, the kind of busty brunette Phil’s mother warned him about when he was younger. The Southern Belle was eyeing him with amused interest, pouty lips quirked in a smile.

 

“I’m Agent Phil Coulson,” Phil said, surveying them. “Thank you for coming in”

 

“Yeah, yeah, what exactly are we here for, though?” Logan said, leaning against the wall and folding his arms across his chest. “The professor didn’t tell us a whole lot.”

 

“You’ve all been invited to join the Avengers,” Phil said, moving back to sit in his chair. “You’re all uniquely gifted in your own ways, and those gifts will lend themselves well to what we do here.”

 

“And just what is it y’do here?” Anna asked, smiling as she leaned forward. “Let’s not beat around the bush now.”

 

“We save the world,” Phil said. “Our mission isn’t too different from the X-Men’s, in fact. The problem is, it’s not just mutants that have a problem with the world as it is.”

 

“Isn’t that what the Army’s for?” Logan said with a quirked eyebrow. “The military? Way I hear it, you’ve got all kinds of fancy crap out there these days. Wings, tanks, armor.”

 

“That’s all well and good, but therein lies the problem,” Phil replied, leaning onto his desk. His gaze moved over them all, and he nodded. “Before we move further, though, I’m required to specify that the information I’m about to reveal is classified above top-secret. Not a word of this is to be alluded to outside of this building, even to your fellow X-Men.”

 

Logan bristled at that, but the rest of them just nodded, and Phil met the Wolverine’s gaze, finding a pair of steely gray eyes glaring back. Still, he held the staring contest unflinchingly until Logan just snorted, nodding.

 

“Yeah, yeah, hush-hush stuff,” he said. “I’m no stranger to secrets.”

 

Phil gave him a small smile.

 

“The government, and by extension the military, has been compromised,” he said. “I’m sure you’re all at least tangentially aware of Hydra.”

 

Logan snarled, and the rest of them all simply nodded grimly. Phil figured that would be the case.

 

Most mutants were no friends of Hydra.

 

“They’re gone, though,” Logan said. “I personally cut a few heads off of them myself back in the day.”

 

“They’re coming back,” Phil said flatly. “They’ve infiltrated the United States government and grown along with it ever since the nineteen-forties. We’ve only just recently become aware of the problem, but it’s too late to launch an internal investigation. Internal Affairs is likely just as compromised as the rest.”

 

“So you’re forming a team from the outside to prod at them,” Logan said. “And you want our help?”

 

“I’m sure you all know the Hydra policy regarding mutants,” Phil said. “We wouldn’t dream of being presumptuous, but we need help, and I’m sure you don’t want to see what Hydra has in mind for the world. If we work together, we stand a good chance of winning. If we work together and lose, you’re no worse off.”

 

“Right, we help you kick these psychos’ asses, and when the press conference rolls around, SHIELD’s the one coming out smelling like roses,” Logan says snidely. “I’ve seen it time and time again.”

 

“You have Director Rogers’s personal assurance that the X-Men will receive an extremely extensive and public thank you from him,” Phil said. “If that’s not good enough, I can arrange a meeting in a private location in which he’ll promise you himself, and as the son of the founder of SHIELD, he has a lot of backing to his word.”

 

“That won’t be necessary,” Ororo said, speaking for the first time and giving Logan a stern look. “Will it, Logan?”

 

Logan tried his best to glare back, but he just huffed, shrugging. “Hey, if we get used and tossed away again, no skin off my teeth, doll.”

 

“I believe I’ve told you not to call me that,” Ororo said icily, her eyes flashing.

 

“Ro,” Anna said, placing a gloved hand on her friend’s wrist. “You can zap him latah, sug. Let’s listen to the handsome fella’s speech.”

 

“Thank you,” Phil said. “The speech portion of the meeting is over, though, sadly. All that’s left is to find out if you’ll be joining the Avengers.”

 

“Well, I’m in,” Warren said, shrugging. “Sounds like fun, and it’ll get me out of that mansion and into something exciting.”

 

“I weel also join,” Colossus said in his thick Russian accent, giving Logan a significant look. The Wolverine growled in his throat, cracking his neck audibly.

 

“Yeah, I’ll do it,” he said. “Like that fucking video game Bobby’s always yammering on about. War never goddamn changes.”

 

“I’m in, and I _know_ Ro’s gonna wanna fight by her honey’s side,” Anna said with an impish smile at Ro, who gave her a lofty look right back.

 

“I would never let my betrothed fight without me,” she said huffily.

 

“Fantastic,” Phil said. “In that case, if you’ll all follow me, I’ll be taking you down to Mr. Stark.”

 

“ _Tony_ Stark?” Anna asked, smirking. “Oh, lawd, this day just gits bettah ‘n’ bettah.”

 

“Knees together, Anna,” Ro said as they stood, and Anna just rolled her eyes.

 

“Jus’ because I can’t take ‘im fer a spin doesn’t mean I can’t admire the view.”

 

Well, at least Tony would get his hourly ego-stroke.

……

 

“Stubby!”

 

“Squirrelly!”

 

“Are you two just gonna do that every time you see each other from now on?” Gwen asks, sounding half-exasperated, half-amused as she watches Harry and me break into a small tribal dance.

 

“Only for another…two months?” I ask Harry, who smirks.

 

“Fuck, at _least_ ,” he says, glancing at Riley, who’s just watching with amusement. “Hey, c’mon, no tribal?”

 

She blinks, smiling sheepishly. “I didn’t wanna intrude on the bro-ment,” she says.

 

“Hey, you’re still a bro,” he says, patting her on the back. “Girls can be bros, no problem. I’m not gonna be like a total bigot that’s like, ‘You’re a clone, you freak!’ or whatever. Did you know Rayburn, the door guy? He was like in-vitro or something, but he’s still just a normal dude.”

 

“I was technically born two weeks ago or something, Harry,” Riley says. “Before that, I was grown in a giant tube.”

 

“So?” Harry asks plainly. “You’re here now, and you’re my best friend in a disturbingly hot bod, so who the fuck cares? If a chick can _accidentally_ get pregnant and the kid’s considered this like totally normal kid, why can’t you be _made_ on _purpose_ and not be a person?”

 

I grin as Riley stares at Harry with wide eyes, biting her lip. “I’m gonna hug you, and it’s not gonna be weird, okay?”

 

“Fuck yeah, it won’t,” Harry says, yanking her into a hug. Riley giggles into his chest, squeezing him tightly, and when she pulls away, she wiping tears from her eyes.

 

“Ah, no, stop it, hormonal girl body,” she says. “I’m sorry, I’ve been crying at like the drop of a hat the last few days.”

 

“Uh-oh,” Gwen says, biting back a smile. “Um…Riley, I think we might need to have a talk about that special thing all girls share, because it sounds like you might be dealing with it soon.”

 

Riley blinks, and the realization hits us both at the same time. She looks at me with abject horror, eyes wide as her face turns red.

 

“No fair!” she says, and I shrug helplessly as Gwen leads her away. “No fair, I didn’t sign up for this!”

 

“None of us did,” Gwen says, smiling back at us. “It’s just the price of biology.”

 

They leave Harry and me alone, and Harry just looks at me with a shrug. “I think I missed something,” he says.

 

“That’s probably for the best,” I tell him. “Where’s your lady?”

 

“Shower,” he says as the doorbell buzzes, and we head out of his room. “We were hot-tubbing before you guys got here, and she didn’t wanna smell like chlorine.”

 

“I like the smell of chlorine,” I say, and he shrugs.

 

“Women, I guess,” he says. “She wants to smell like flowers and shit or something.”

 

We reach the front door, and Harry presses the intercom.

 

“Lester’s Lollipop Emporium, what can get for you to sssssuck today?” he asks, and I snicker, shaking my head.

 

“Let us up, you giant pervert,” Mary Jane’s voice says, and Harry buzzes her up.

 

“’Us’?” he asks me, and I shrug.

 

“She must’ve brought Lana,” I say. “You know, the one – “

 

“Explodey hands chick,” Harry says, waggling his fingers. “Yeah, you told me about her.”

 

“She’s alright,” I insist, and Harry rolls his eyes.

 

“Right, like I have to worry about you,” he says. “If anyone’s not alright, you’re the one that’s gonna be kicking their asses while I watch.”

 

“From your super-awesome hoverboard,” I remind him, and grins.

 

“Dude, I want a lightsaber so bad!” he says. I just shake my head.

 

“Waaaay too dangerous,” I insist. “You can _maybe_ have like a sword with some electrical zappy powers, but a full-on plasma sword is just not in the cards.”

 

He snorts but concedes my point with a shrug. “Yeah, well, I guess you’re just making sure I don’t end up all Darth Vader with fucking robo-limbs everywhere,” he says. “Even though that would be totally badass. Jujube!”

 

I turn and see Jubilee frowning at Harry as he rushes over and hugs her. She’s wearing jeans and a pink tank-top with a button-down yellow shirt, her hair pulled back with a bright pink headband.

 

“Harry, what have I told you about the nickname?” she asks.

 

“Uh, you totally love it because it’s embarrassing but adorable, and I love you?” Harry insists. She huffs and kisses him, shoving him away with a little giggle.

 

“All true, but still….” She sighs and spots me, smiling. “Hey, Pete.”

 

“’Sup?” I greet her. “Settling in alright?”

 

“So much more than alright,” she insists. “I love it here. Harry’s so sweet, I feel like some kind of Asian princess with like a knight in shining armor.”

 

“Babe, you are _the_ Asian princess,” Harry says fervently. “Shanghai warriors fought for many moons to ensure that your beauty would endure forever, like the sakura of old.”

 

Jubilee snickers, tapping him on the chest in a light smacking motion. “You’re mixing your cultures there, but that is just so cute,” she says. “Hey, so, _someone_ told me he had Surge in his fridge, but I’m not finding it.”

 

“Ah, because I have it in the super-secret password-protected fridge,” Harry says as the door buzzes. “Pete, you got that?”

 

“Go drown in nineties nostalgia,” I say, waving them off. “I’ll greet the ladies.”

 

The nostalgia-couple takes off for the kitchen, leaving me to open the door for MJ and Lana. I peek out into the small landing outside of the elevator and find them disembarking, MJ watching Lana’s wide-eyed reaction with amusement.

 

“Seriously, spider powers, a hot chick entourage, and oh yeah, he has a rich best friend?” Lana asks. “Peter Parker is the luckiest fucking bastard.”

 

“I prefer to think of it as the universe paying him back for a pretty shitty hand it dealt him,” MJ says, and Lana hums thoughtfully, nodding.

 

“Yeah, I guess,” she says. “Still, I want Norman Osborn to adopt me so I can just live here.”

 

“I could probably arrange that,” I say, and the two girls jump, MJ smiling widely.

 

“Peter,” she sings, skipping over and hugging me. “Hey, you.”

 

“How’s it going?” I ask, and she hums happily as she squeezes me.

 

“Better,” she says, pulling away, and I turn to Lana, who gives me an awkward sort of wave when she sees me looking at her.

 

“I don’t need a hug, thanks,” she says, and I smirk.

 

“You sure?” I ask, and she rolls her eyes. “No one’s gonna judge you for a hug.”

 

“If I act all bitchy and huffy while I hug you, can we just roll with it?” she asks.

 

“Absolutely,” I tell her. She steps forward, giving me a quick hug before pushing me away and heading for the door.

 

“Alright, let’s party,” she says, charging into the penthouse. “Osborn! Refreshments!”

 

“She is so cute sometimes,” MJ says with a giggle.

 

“She really just hates emotions but can’t stop feeling lots of them,” I add.

 

“It doesn’t help that she’s completely in love with you,” MJ says, prompting a sigh from me.

 

“I’m trying _not_ to dredge up more emotional crap,” I say. She just shakes her head.

 

“Pete, c’mon,” she says. “None of us want you to feel bad about the fact that you’re just super charming and shit.”

 

“Is there some kind of council of girls that I’ve somehow managed to accidentally make fall in love with me?” I ask wryly, and he quirks an eyebrow at me.

 

“Would you believe me if I said yes?” she asks.

 

“Oh, just don’t do this to me,” I beg her, and she steps closer, hugging me again.

 

“Pete, I told you,” she says. “Relax. Look, I don’t ever want to hear that you’re being any less than the amazing guy you are just because you’re afraid of making one or two girls decide that they really like you. You’re…you’re so _good_ , and that’s why you can’t seem to stop charming a few girls here and there. And if that’s the price of you making the world a better place, so be it, alright?”

 

“You say that like it’s so easy for me to just…disregard that fact that these girls like me and – “

 

“Hey,” Lana says from the doorway, leaning against the frame with a cocktail frank held between her fingers. “Are we _still_ getting all fucking emo about the whole ‘chick-magnet’ thing?”

 

“It’s so sweet, isn’t it?” MJ asks, and Lana snorts, snagging the frank off the toothpick before strolling over to me.

 

“Your cousin or whatever is looking for you,” she says. “Some fucking freaky family resemblance there.”

 

“Yeah, we get that a lot,” I say strolling past her into the room. She sticks an arm out to block my progress for a moment, her hand coming up to poke a finger at my chin.

 

“Chin up, Buttercup,” she says. “Whenever I see that mopey face, I just wanna smack it.”

 

“Well, we wouldn’t want that,” I chuckle, and she smirks at me.

 

“I dunno, you seem like a guy that gets his rocks off on a few good slaps,” she says. “While else would you go throwing yourself headfirst into every fight this side of the Queensborough Bridge?”

 

I stop at that, humming thoughtfully. “Huh…now I need to reevaluate my life or something.”

 

“Get out of here, you dumbass,” Lana says with a smirk, shaking her head as I head into the penthouse and find Riley sitting on a loveseat near the window, looking mournfully out the window. I make my way over, sitting next to her.

 

“You alright?” I ask her, and she sighs.

 

“You think really hard about that question and tell me the answer,” she says glumly.

 

“Not especially,” I guess, and she snorts.

 

“I…I’m trying to stay positive, and…I mean, everyone’s been really great and supportive, and Harry made me cry, which is just….” She sighs, shaking her head. “I miss being _you_. Suddenly, I’m a girl, and I have to deal with girl things, and…I mean, it was weird and ‘Haha, gender-swap antics’ for a while, but now….”

 

“The reality is sinking in,” I finish for her, and she nods, sighing.

 

“Novelty’s worn off, you know?” she says, shrugging. “Now I just have to…deal with it.”

 

“You’ll be alright,” I say. “We’ll all help you. I’m sure Gwen gave you a pep talk about how all girls have to deal with girl issues.”

 

“Yeah, but I also grew up happy knowing I would never _have_ to worry about those firsthand,” Riley says. “Now it’s like, ‘Just kidding!’ and all of a sudden, I do.”

 

“Do you need me to get MJ in here to hug you?” I ask, and Riley rolls her eyes.

 

“Gwen’s already seen to that,” she says, smiling over at me. “I guess I’m just…worried about the whole….”

 

“It’s inevitable, but you don’t know what to expect besides a whole lot of negative hype, so you’re just waiting for it,” I say, and she nods.

 

“I like that,” she says. “I don’t have to explain stuff to you, you just sympathize.”

 

“Pete!” MJ’s voice calls from the doorway before I can respond. “Come here!”

 

I glance over at Riley, who shrugs and stands as well. “I can tag along, right?”

 

“Always,” I tell her, and we head for the door, where I see MJ letting Flash and a boy I can only assume is Bobby Drake into the party. Flash waves at me on his way to see Harry.

 

“Parker!” he yells. “Yo, brought a surprise for you, go say hi!”

 

“Thompson, how the fuck are ya!?” Harry calls on his way over to greet Flash with a bro-hug.

 

I head for the door, MJ hurrying me over with a wave of her hand. I step past her and peer into the hallway, my eyes shooting wide at what I see. A pair of warm brown eyes I haven’t seen in months, a pale, freckled face, and shy, sweet little smile that widens when I come into view.

 

“Pete,” Jess Cambell says, her eyes shining as she steps closer and peers up at me. “Hey, you.”

 

“Jess,” I say, feeling like my voice has left me, used up by that one word. What is she doing here? Last I knew, she was in Ohio, hundreds of miles away. She could’ve called or something. I understand that surprises are nice, but this is more of a complete shock. Before I can start to sort any of this out, she’s hugging me, arms wrapped tightly around my waist, and oh man, I forgot how great her hugs feel.

 

“Peter,” she whispers into my neck, holding me tightly as I return the embrace. “God, I’ve missed you so much.”

 

“Missed you, too,” I say, my arms dropping, but she’s still squeezing me tight.

 

“I’m not done hugging you yet,” she giggles sheepishly against me. “Deal with it.”

 

“Consider it dealt with,” I say with a chuckle, rubbing her shoulders. I look up and see Gwen approaching with a curious look. “Gwen, Jess is back!”

 

She blinks, realization setting in, and a huge smile spreads on her face. “Jess, oh my gosh!” she runs over and wraps her arms around both of us. “Welcome back!”

 

Jess gasps and smiles as she spins and leaps into a hug with Gwen, who holds her tightly before pulling away.

 

“What are you doing here?” Gwen asks with wide eyes. “I mean, really glad to see you, but you’re supposed to be in Ohio, aren’t you?”

 

“Well…it’s kind of a weird story,” Jess says. “It…it turns out I’m a mutant.”

 

“Okay, let’s go sit down,” I say, leading her over to the couch and settling in. Gwen all but pushes Jess into my lap and sits next to me, Jess squeaking but sort of curling up into my arms, seeming very pleased with the arrangement. I see a shocked Riley standing nearby, eyes wide as they fall on Jess. Before I can feel too bad for my clone, though, MJ swoops in and scoops her up in a hug.

 

“Let’s hit the hot tub, yeah?” she asks Riley, who just nods feebly.

 

“Um…sure,” she agrees. MJ waves Lana over, and she just toddles confusedly behind them.

 

“What’s wrong with her?” she asks.

 

“Long story,” MJ says.

 

They stroll away, passing Flash, Bobby, and Johnny, who sound like they’re gearing up for a round of Rock Band in Harry’s room. Harry approaches them with Jubilee on his arm, both of them carrying cans of Surge.

 

“Harry, show them your Rock Band setup,” Flash says, and Harry grins. “We should jam out.”

 

“Fuck yeah, man, let’s turn it up to eleven!” he yells, leading the charge to his bedroom.

 

Meanwhile, my ex is in my lap looking quite pleased while my current girlfriend sits next to us and doesn’t seem bothered at all by the setup. Oh, and Kitty Pryde is looking curiously at us, sitting in a nearby armchair, oblivious to the fact that her superhero crush is stuck between his ex and his girlfriend.

 

This is getting complicated again.

 

Gwen spots Kitty, who smiles sheepishly.

 

“Sorry, need a moment?” she asks. “Um…I can go…join the bro-band?”

 

“No, it’s okay,” Jess says, smiling at Kitty before looking up at me. “Right?”

 

I’m still trying to reconcile the fact that she’s here, her slim but definitely solid weight in my lap slightly different from Gwen’s but still familiar, her scent and voice and demeanor setting off a nostalgia trip that’s rendering me (as has been happening disturbingly often lately) almost incapable speech.

 

“Pete?” Gwen asks, giggling softly. “He’s in shock.”

 

Jess’s hand waves in front of me, and I snap out of my thoughts to see her giving me a smile.

 

“Yeah, sorry,” I say. “Um…this is just a bit…surreal. Very good kinds of surreal, but it’s just…. Mentally, to me, you were in Ohio, and now you’re here, so my brain’s kinda just catching up.”

 

“Peter Parker, super-genius, has to play mental catchup?” Jess asks. “Color _me_ surprised.”

 

“It _is_ awesome to see you, though,” I tell her, hugging her. “It…I thought I wouldn’t see you until like…summer, at least, but pessimistically, after high-school.”

 

She smiles, snuggling into my arms. “Now we can see each other at least every weekend,” she says softly with a look over to Gwen, who’s just leaning against me, a little smile on her face as she watches us.

 

She’s taking this whole thing very smoothly.

 

“So, you’re a mutant?” Gwen prompts Jess, who nods.

 

“Oh, right, yeah,” she says. “Um, I have…I guess Human Torch powers.”

 

“It really is pretty much the same thing,” Kitty says, watching the three of us with apparent curiosity in her huge eyes, but she seems ready to shrug off Gwen’s newfound openness to cuddly behavior from Jess. “It’s…actually got Hank back home looking into the possibility of latent mutant genes that are activated by high levels of gamma radiation.”

 

“Which is great, you know, that I was good for something, because Dad wasn’t thrilled to find out he has a mutant daughter,” Jess says, trying to sound blasé about the whole thing, but I recognize the little tremor in her voice and find myself reflexively hugging her.

 

“Is he that much of a bigot?” Gwen asks, sounding shocked. “Wow. His own daughter.”

 

“He’s…terrified of anything that doesn’t fit into his narrow little worldview,” Jess says. “Or…it’s more like, he just wants to keep it all out of his life. Like, the crazy side of the world can go on about its business, but it better stay away from him.”

 

“That’s demented,” I say. “The world’s changing around him, and he just can’t accept it.”

 

“Pretty much,” Jess says with a sigh. “He accused Mom of cheating on him, lying to him about being a mutant, anything he could make up to victimize himself, even though this whole thing was a fluke or something.”

 

“What about Phil?” I ask, and she shrugs.

 

“If he _is_ a mutant, it’s not gonna show up for a few more years,” she says, letting a little laugh. “God knows _he’s_ not maturing anytime soon. Of course, he thinks this is the coolest thing ever. Last time he visited, he insisted I be on fire as often as possible.”

 

“So, you’re living at the mansion now?” Gwen asks.

 

“Mhm,” Jess says. “It’s…so much better than Ohio. I mean, it’s not New York, but the mansion is so nice.”

 

“It is beautiful,” Gwen says, earning an odd look from Kitty. “So I read.”

 

“Uh-huh,” Kitty says, and I realize Gwen’s slip-up. As far as Kitty knows, these two random kids have never been to the X-Mansion, but Spider-Man and Black Widow have. No doubt, Kitty’s thinking the same thing, looking from Gwen to me. When her eyes land on me, they widen almost imperceptibly, her face turning pink as she bites her lip.

 

“Oh, great,” I mutter, sighing, my head flopping gently against Jess’s.

 

“Oof,” she breathes out as I connect, looking up at me. “What’s up, Pete?”

 

I just look significantly at Kitty, who shakes her head.

 

“I won’t tell,” she says instantly. “I mean…I don’t even technically _know_ , it’s just…a suspicion that I kinda really hope is true, because if you’re…the _guy_ , I’m glad you’re actually a pretty sweet guy outside of…your hobby.”

 

“We’re not very good at the whole secret identity thing, are we?” Gwen mutters, and I shake my head.

 

“We are,” I insist, “until we actually talk to anyone. I’m gonna work on a voice modulator or something, so we don’t sound like ourselves.”

 

“So, you’re…?” Kitty trails off, looking at us, and I meet Gwen’s eyes. She just sighs.

 

“Yeah, it’s us,” she says. “Surprise.”

 

“Ah!” Kitty gasps, bouncing a bit in her seat. “I was hoping I’d see you guys again! I mean, when Flash invited me along to this thing, the only reason I agreed was because you guys are from New York, so I thought I’d get to see you, but this is even better!”

 

“Pete, I’m pretty sure like a dozen people know you’re Spider-Man by now,” Jess sighs, giggling. “Even with that mask, the adorkable charm just leaks right through.”

 

“It does,” Kitty says with a little laugh. “It’s actually really cute.”

 

“I _told_ you,” Gwen says, and I sigh, rolling my eyes.

 

“Thank you, Gwen,” I say wryly, and she winks, leaning in to kiss my cheek. “Jeez, I think the only ones here that don’t know are Flash and Bobby.”

 

“Well, if they’re gonna join the Neighborhood Watch, you might wanna think about telling them,” Gwen says, and I sigh.

 

“We are not – “  


“Oh, yes we are,” Gwen says. “Jess?”

 

“Well, once I get my fire powers figured out, I’d love to join a superhero group, but only if it’s called the Neighborhood Watch,” she says with an impish smile at me.

 

“Noooo, not you, too!” I say with theatrical lament. “What cruel fate is this?”

 

Jess leans in and kisses my other cheek. “Sorry, majority vote,” she teases. “Besides, what ideas do _you_ have?”

 

“The Empire State Militia?” I suggest, and Kitty makes a small noise of approval.

 

“I actually kinda like that one,” she says, and Gwen snickers.

 

“That’s boring, though,” she says. “And it also way overestimates our scope. We’re keeping track of New York City, not the whole state.”

 

“Okay, then…the City Guard?” I suggest, and Gwen smirks, glancing over at Kitty and motioning her over. Looking a bit confused but smiling, she stands and heads over. Gwen leans in and whispers in her ear, and Kitty looks a bit shocked.

 

“Are you sure?” she asks softly, and Gwen nods.

 

“What?” I ask, glancing between the three of them as Gwen leans in and nuzzles against my cheek, Jess tucking her head up under my chin while Kitty crawls up and presses a giggling kiss to my other cheek. Feeling my heart hammering, I groan and concede defeat.

 

“Ugh, alright, it’s the Neighborhood Watch.”

 

“There, was that so hard?” Gwen asks, and Jess giggles in my lap, giving me a wide-eyed smile.

 

“Not a word,” I mouth to her, and she winks at me, snuggling into my chest again.

 

“I missed you so much,” she says in a quiet voice. “Ohio suuuuucks, and then I…wasn’t exactly in a good mood when I got there.”

 

“I could tell from your paragraph rants on Facebook,” I say, and she shakes against me with quiet chuckles. “I could probably collect them and have enough for a research paper of some kind. _Ohio: No, Really, This Place Is The Worst._ ”

 

She bursts out laughing and kisses my chin. “I bet the Daily Bugle would publish it.”

 

“A slam piece based entirely on one opinion?” I say. “They’d start a column for you.”

 

“If I can make money on a weekly column talking shit about whatever pisses me off that week, I’d consider myself a successful human being,” she says. “You can proofread.”

 

“You joke, but that’s a legitimate thing real people do for actual money,” I tell her, and she smirks.

 

“Who said I was joking?” she quips, hugging me again.

 

Gwen watches us for a moment before patting my shoulder.

 

“Pete, do you mind if…maybe I borrow Jess for just a little bit?” she asks. “I know she just got back, but like five minutes, promise.”

 

“Um…if that’s alright with her?” I ask, looking down at Jess, who nods, extricating herself from my lap.

 

“Yeah, I think some girl talk is probably in order,” she says sheepishly, and Gwen hugs her.

 

“It’s good girl talk, promise,” she says, tugging her toward the hall. “Kitty, keep him entertained?”

 

I look back to Kitty, who’s watching wide-eyed as the pair leaves. She looks back at me, and I have to laugh at how adorably shocked she looks, suddenly left alone with her super-crush.

 

“So, how do I entertain you?” she asks. “Do you chase laser pointers?”

 

“Not recently,” I tell her.

 

That gives her pause for a moment, and she giggles bemusedly. “You _have_ , though?”

 

“Okay, so…my Uncle Ben used to have this laser pointer he got at work,” I tell her. “He accidentally brought it home in his pocket or something, and he was just showing it to my Aunt May, and apparently, three-year-old Peter Parker thought it was the bees’ knees.”

 

“Oh my gosh,” Kitty says, placing her hands to her mouth as she grins.

 

“Yeah, I chased it around the living room, literally until I fell asleep,” I say, and she squeaks out a laugh.

 

“This is adorable!” she says. “Did you stay with your aunt and uncle a lot?”

 

“I was actually raised by them,” I tell her. “My parents left me with them when I was three, when they went on some mission or something for the government.”

 

“Oh, no,” she says softly, and I shake my head.

 

“It’s…not that bad,” I say. “I mean, it’s not like some Harry Potter setup where I slept in a cupboard. They were the best.”

 

“Well, that’s good, at least,” Kitty says, grinning at me. “So, when you first said Uncle Ben, all I thought of was the rice brand.”

 

“Ha,” I say flatly. “Actually, when we’d go shopping, _every_ time we passed the rice, he would pick up a box, show it to me, and just shake his head and say ‘I need to find out how they keep getting a hold of my rice.’”

 

“Your uncle sounds awesome,” she says. I just nod.

 

“He…he was,” I say, and she gasps.

 

“Oh, I…I didn’t….”

 

“You didn’t know,” I say, smiling at her. “It’s alright.”

 

“I’m so sorry,” she says with a hunch of her shoulders. “Now I wanna hug you.”

 

“I don’t see why that would be a problem,” I say. She smiles, scooting closer, bringing the smell of her perfume as she gives me a quick squeeze.

 

“Are you comfortable talking about it?” she asks, and I shrug.

 

“It…it’s funny, there are probably three different people that blame themselves for it,” I say. “But it was just a lot of people doing stupid stuff, only one of them was in a dark, desperate place and thought crime was the answer he was looking for.”

 

“What happened?” Kitty asks softly, still sitting quite close to me, her knees touching mine

 

“I guess it all really started with me being a stupid teenager at a party….”

 

……

 

Mary Jane had thought she was done with the teenage party life.

 

Here she was, though, sipping punch out of what had to the most expensive plastic cup she had ever held, sitting in a hot tub with a reforming super-criminal and a female clone of her best friend.

 

Alright, so it wasn’t quite the _typical_ teenage party.

 

Though, the fact that she could hear the muffled sounds of one of the most truly intense Rock Band sessions in living memory from just across the hall told her that some things never changed.

 

And that Jubilee had a pretty awful singing voice but made it for it with sheer commitment.

 

“Lana, say _something_ ,” Riley said with a nervous little laugh.

 

“Your entire life is just too fucking weird,” Lana shot back, and Riley shrugged.

 

“I completely agree,” she said. “Look, I’m sorry I kept it from you at first, but…I just didn’t wanna draw you back into the weird stuff. You’re trying to get your life back in order, and I was respecting that.”

 

“Oh, give me a fucking break,” Lana said, though she gave Riley a pouty little smile. “Okay, that’s nice and everything, but ‘Hi, this is my cousin from literally out of nowhere, by the way, she looks just like me and has spider powers too.’. Kinda idiot do you take me for?”

 

Riley’s response was the same toothy sheepish smile Peter got sometimes, but her female features meant that it was much less of Peter’s brand of charming adorability and much more of a new kind of cute sweetness.

 

That was going to get her into a lot of trouble.

 

“It sounded a lot better in my head,” Riley said, and Lana just sighed.

 

“So, is it totally fucking weird being a girl?” she asked, and Riley nodded.

 

“I’m…only barely starting to get used to it,” she said. “Gwen’s been awesome, though. She kinda gave me like a crash course in how to girl properly.”

 

“That’s sweet of her,” Mary Jane said, reaching out to poke Riley. “Don’t forget you have me. And probably Lana, too.”

 

“Ew, no fucking way,” Lana said, smirking. “Do it like I did, learn it off the internet. When I got my first period, Mom bought me a box of Tampax and some Midol, sat me in front of the computer, and said ‘Good luck, kid.’”

 

“That goes a long way toward explaining your general…you-ness,” Mary Jane said, and Lana smirked.

 

“That’s the nicest way anyone’s ever said it,” she said.

 

“So…how’s Gwen been handling the fact that you like remember being her boyfriend?” Mary Jane asked, turning back to Riley. The brunette just shrugged.

 

“She’s…trying,” she said. “But it’s…extra super complicated, you know? I mean, I’m a girl, and she’s very not into girls. And it’s not like I’ve been…like Peter’s been _replaced_ by me. I just got dropped into your lives. So Gwen…and _anyone_ that has a thing for Peter,” she added with a look at both of them, “it’s like…. If I were to try for a relationship with any of them, I’d be like a consolation prize. Peter would always be there, and…I dunno, it’d feel like I didn’t quite earn it or something.”

 

Aw, the poor girl. Mary Jane scooted over and hugged her, making Riley blush a bit, but she hugged gratefully back.

 

“So, what are you gonna do?” Mary Jane asked, and Riley smiled.

 

“I’ll just…meet someone, I guess,” she said. “Eventually. I wanna get…used to this whole thing first.”

 

“Yeah, you should probably settle into being a chick before you go meeting other ones,” Lana said. “Just watch out. This little after-school super-team you’re building has like…four boys, and I’ve already seen Johnny checking out your ass.”

 

“That is…seven shades of awkward,” Riley said, and Mary Jane giggled. Poor Johnny had to deal with the fact that Riley was the brain of his man-crush in a (MJ had to admit) rather attractive female body. Even Harry seemed to be having some trouble coming to terms with it, though he at least had Jubilee to hold his attention. Time would only tell how Flash or his new pal Bobby Drake would handle it, if they were ever told the truth.

 

For MJ (and Lana, most likely), it was much the same as Gwen. Here was a girl that had all of the qualities that originally attracted them to Peter, but in a body that they just weren’t physically into. Sure, Riley was definitely a catch, but MJ had gone through that phase and determined that she was most definitely straight. According to Lana, after dealing with her bitchy mom for fifteen years and “a whole bag of Daddy issues I’m still trying to sort out”, she was definitely into guys and a little attached to Peter.

 

“Hey,” Riley said, smiling over at her. “Don’t look so glum.”

 

MJ just smiled and reached over to poke Riley in the nose.

 

“Boop,” Riley said, looking cross-eyed at the finger.

 

“Some girl is gonna fall head-over-tits for you, you know that?” MJ said, and Riley snickered.

 

“MJ, most girls’ heads are _already_ over their tits,” she said, and MJ rolled her eyes.

 

“Psh, details,” she said, looking up as she heard the door open. Gwen and Jess approached them, Gwen crouching down next to MJ.

 

“Having fun?” she asked, them, and MJ nodded.

 

“Bubbles, good company, and quality music,” she said, gesturing toward the sound of the Rock Band concert. “What’s not to like?”

 

Gwen giggled, looking at something over MJ’s shoulder, MJ turned to see Riley staring at Jess with a sad sort of longing.

 

“Um…hi?” Jess said with a small wave. “Wow, you look…just like Pete, that’s weird.”

 

“Yeah, I get that a lot,” Riley said. “It’s…a long story.”

 

“Not that long a story,” Lana said, shrugging, but Gwen cut her off before she could say much more.

 

“But one that…can wait for a little bit, right?” Gwen said, glancing at Riley. “Unless you wanna tell it now?”

 

Riley blinked up at Gwen, smiling. “It can wait, if you have something else?”

 

“I’m sorry, it’s just…I’d like to have a little girl-talk with Jess and MJ, and I kinda need Jess not to be crazy distracted by our random-weird adventures,” she says. “Please don’t think I’m like belittling – “

 

“Gwen, I’ll be okay,” Riley said with a small laugh. “I have a weird backstory, we can save it for later.”

 

“Well, now I’m just curious,” Jess said with a little laugh, giving Riley a playful smile. “Will I get to hear your mysterious backstory later, girl of mystery?”

 

Riley nodded, and though MJ had never actually seen Peter and Jess’s relationship in its “prime” days before Uncle Ben’s death, she could tell from the look of pure adoration in Riley’s eyes that Harry’s insistence that it had been “diabetes-inducingly cute” was pretty justified.

 

“Promise,” she said in a slightly breathy voice. Gwen grabbed a towel, and MJ climbed out of the water, stepping into the fluffy cloth giving herself a quick dry-job as she followed Gwen and Jess into the chilly hallway.

 

“Did you and that girl have a thing?” MJ heard Lana asking Riley as they left.

 

“So, what’s this about?” Jess asked as they walked, Gwen leading them further down the hall to a small, disused office at the end. They all stepped in, and Gwen shut the door behind them, leaning against it with a sigh. Now that they were alone, she seemed twitchy, nervous. “Gwen, you alright?”

 

“Kinda,” Gwen said, taking a deep breath and placing her hands to her forehead. “I’m…about to take a plunge here, and…can we do like a quicksave? Whatever stupid shit I say here can just be forgotten, and if it all goes to hell, we walk out of this room like nothing ever happened?”

 

Jess looked confused, but she nodded, shrugging. “Yeah, Gwen, I…I mean, you’re one of my best friends,” she said.

 

“Same,” MJ said, walk-skipping over and hugging Gwen carefully so as not to get her clothes wet from her dip in the hot tub. “Gwen, we’re pals for life. What is it?”

 

Gwen nodded, as though what they had said had steeled her resolve or something. “I’m just gonna ask straight-on then,” she said. “Jess…you’re still in love with Pete, right?”

 

Jess blinked, eyes going wide as she stared at Gwen. “Um…well…yeah,” she admitted. “Gwen, I’m so sorry – “

 

“Jess, I’m not mad,” Gwen cut over her. “I promise. You two had no reason to break up except you moving away and Pete going through some…stuff. The fact that you cared enough about him to break it off and let him have that closeness with someone else was…really awesome of you.”

 

“I would have tried to get over him, but podunk Ohio is not the best place to find a boyfriend if you don’t like trucks and hunting,” Jess muttered, and Gwen giggled.

 

Then she turned to MJ.

 

Oh, crap.

 

“MJ, I know we’ve been kinda not really talking about this,” she said softly, and MJ felt her heart leap in her chest.

 

“I’ve barely been letting _myself_ think about it, Gwen,” she whined, shaking her head. “He’s _your_ boyfriend, and he’s obviously completely in love with you. I didn’t wanna stir anything up. I know we’ve all had enough drama for…like, ever.”

 

“True,” Jess muttered, and Gwen let a snort.

 

“Okay, but…you are?” she asked. “In love with him?”

 

“God, Gwen, I’m…hopelessly in love with him,” MJ sighed, the words spilling out. “If it wasn’t for Pete, I’d still be some pretend preppy cheerleader with a new boyfriend every week and a bunch of fake friends I know nothing about. Thanks to him, I’m…a superhero with actual _real_ friends for the first time in my life. And I don’t wanna lose those friends, so….”

 

Suddenly, she was being hugged, not just my Gwen but by Jess as well, and she felt herself relax into the twin embraces, slumping against one of them, she wasn’t sure which. The fact that she had just spilled her guts but they were still hugging her meant that she was probably forgiven for these feelings she couldn’t help but didn’t want to let go just yet.

 

Even if it was unrequited, being in genuine love with someone was…such a terribly amazing feeling.

 

They all broke apart, and Gwen let a sigh, taking a deep breath. “Okay,” she said, sounding relieved. “Okay, so it’s all out in the open, and that’s good.” She slumped against the expensive hardwood executive desk that was probably bigger than her bed, turning to glance at the sunlight glinting off the skyline. “So…I’ve been doing a lot of thinking. About…about what you guys mean to me and to Peter, and…how much it sucks to see someone with the person you love but to not be able to be _mad_ at that person. And…even worse, I feel…I feel bad that I’m with Peter, and you guys obviously really like him.”

 

“Gwen, don’t feel like that,” Jess insisted, shaking her head fervently. “It’s no one’s fault.”

 

“Still, I…I think I might have an idea to make everyone happy, but it’s…it’s really unconventional,” Gwen said. “It’s just…if it goes well, there shouldn’t be any drama anymore. We all get what we want.”

 

“What are we supposed to do, share him?” MJ asked wryly.

 

Gwen shrugged. “Would…would that be so bad?” she asked.

 

MJ wasn’t sure she was hearing the girl right. Was she really suggesting they simply _all_ date Peter at the _same time_?

 

“Gwen,” Jess said, fixing her with a beady eye. “I think you’ll have to explain a bit more. I’m not sure I think I’m getting the right idea here.”

 

Gwen just took another deep breath. “So…so, we all love Peter, and all of us are also at least good friends, and I’m thinking that since we’re all pretty close, it’ll make it a lot easier for us all to kind of…all be Peter’s girlfriends at the same time,” she blathered on. “Like…I’m not suggesting some kind of weird orgy deal or something, but we all just…don’t have to worry about me getting jealous or you guys getting jealous. We all just…take down those little barriers you guys have. I know you guys want to be way more affectionate with him than you are, but you’re not because you guys respect me, and that’s why I feel like we can do this. We all respect each other. So…you guys can be as affectionate with him as you want, and I won’t get upset, okay?”

 

There was a long moment of silence after that little rant, Gwen leaning heavily against the desk. MJ turned her words over in her head, nodding after a moment.

 

“I…I think I get it,” she said carefully. “But…but, Gwen, are you sure? I mean, I’m all for giving this a shot, and…it’s really…like, you have a lot of courage for even suggesting it, but….”

 

“I’ve already been thinking about it a lot,” Gwen said, shaking her head. “It’s just something I thought of one night, like, ‘We’re all so in love with Peter, why should I be the only one allowed to express how much I love him?’ And…I’m gonna talk to be Pete about it, see if he would be okay with it. But, I mean, I think it would be a relief for him, really. This is as much for his benefit, so he doesn’t have to get all angsty, especially now that Jess is back.”

 

“Ugh, I was actually ready for him to start brooding the moment I showed up,” Jess said with a snicker.

 

“Yeah, but…that’s what we’re here for, right?” Gwen said with a smile. “He’s had so much actual bad going on in his life, it’s not good if he’s also freaking out about stupid teenager stuff. He obviously cares about all of us, and that makes him feel guilty. So…let’s remove the guilt factor and…just tell him it’s okay to let his guard down with _all_ of us.”

 

“I…that does sound nice,” Jess said softly. “I remember the way he would kinda tense up whenever you like hugged him while we were dating, like he was afraid of making me mad. I know he…he was in love with you while we were dating.”

 

“And he’s definitely got some stuff he’s not ready to admit about MJ,” Gwen said, and MJ blinked, glancing up at her.

 

“What?” she asked. Peter was into her _that_ way? “No way.”

 

“MJ, c’mon,” Gwen said. “He cares about you enough to build you a set of armor that he literally conceptualized from nothing. He invented technology that caught the eye of an African king, just for you.”

 

Well, when she put it like that, it sounded great and all.

 

“Well…okay, I suppose,” she said, feeling her face heat up, and Gwen smiled at her.

 

“So…we’re gonna do this?” she asked, looking between them. “I can talk to him about it tonight.”

 

Jess bit her lip but nodded. “I’m willing to give it a shot,” she said.

 

They looked at MJ.

 

“Um,” she said, thinking of actually being able to hold Pete, to do something as simple but coupley as hold his hand or kiss him goodbye at night. Even if she was sharing such things with Gwen and Jess, it still sounded like something she’d enjoy. A lot. “Yeah, let’s go for it.”

 

Gwen reached out and pulled them both in for another hug, giggling with relief. “Okay!” she said. “Okay, we’re gonna try this.”

 

She was just pulling away when the door burst open, and Pete ran in, looking mildly confused at the sight of the three of them having some huddle, but he just shook his head.

 

“Situation,” he said. “Big one. Downtown. Time to move out.”

 

“What’s going on?”

 

Peter sighed. “The usual.” MJ grumbled.

 

“The usual is never good.”

 

……

 

Oh, this isn’t good.

 

After hastily explaining to Flash and Bobby that yes, we are in fact the Spider-Trio featured all over the news and Mary Jane is Jackpot and Johnny is _that_ Johnny while also being Dusk, the whole group set out except for Jess, who is still fairly inexperienced with her powers, Harry, whose armor is still in design phase, Lana, who is effectively powerless for the moment, and Jubilee, who doesn’t have any powers or armor yet.

 

There’s a brief moment at the takeoff point, as Kitty is donning an improvised costume so as to keep suspicion off of us in case she ever hangs out with us outside of our Spider-personas, where Gwen poses a very important question.

 

“So, how is she gonna like travel with us?” she asks, gesturing at Kitty, who smiles sheepishly before pulling her mask over her face.

 

“That’s actually a pretty good question,” she points out. “I mean, I can do kind of a zero-gravity walk thing, but it’s not that fast. I could piggyback with one of you guys?”

 

She looks pointedly at me, and Gwen just sighs.

 

“You can probably handle a passenger better than me,” she says, shrugging. “Just be careful. Kitty, if you start to fall or slip – “

 

“I keep meekly quiet and fall to my doom,” she says matter-of-factly. “I got this.”

 

“Alright, I’m just being cautious,” Gwen says, holding her hands up defensively, and Kitty giggles.

 

“I understand,” she says, skipping happily over to me and climbing onto my back, wrapping her legs around me and gripping onto my shoulders. Her voice whispers softly in my ear. “Just so you know, this is like in the top three of best days ever.”

 

“Glad I can help your dreams come true,” I say, glancing over at the group we have assembled. Gwen as Black Widow, Riley as the Scarlet Spider (a name given by the press that she ran with), MJ as Jackpot, Flash as Electro (looking thrilled to be working alongside Spider-Man), Bobby Drake as Iceman, and Johnny as Dusk, with Kitty as Shadowcat clinging to my back and quivering with excitement.

 

“Baymax, you there?” I say to my newly-designed AI, which for the moment is basically a heavily-customized Siri with some personally-designed functions for crime-fighting.

 

“ _Hello, Peter_ ,” Baymax’s voice says into my ear. “ _There is a—riot—on the corner of –_ “

 

“Yeah, I heard about it, pal,” I tell him. “Give me a web-swing route there. Everyone follow me. When we get on-site, I want Dusk and Jackpot running interference on whatever’s causing this ruckus and the civilians. Everyone else, standby until we get a good look at what we’re dealing with.”

 

“Who put him in charge?” Bobby Drake asks as I open the window from Harry’s bedroom, our standard staging area.

 

“Bobby, c’mon, this is Spider-Man!” Flash says, pumping his fists triumphantly. “This is a dream come true! Lead on, Spidey!”

 

“Charmed,” I say, hopping onto the windowsill and leaping, hearing Kitty scream joyously in my ear as we fall before I stick my hand out and web toward the disturbance.

 

According to the news, which is sketchy, it’s some kind of small-scale Godzilla attack. No camera crew has been able to get close enough to get a good look; Channel 7 sent in a chopper, but it was very quickly taken out by a surface-to-air school bus.

 

So all we know is there is at least one very large mutated…thing attacking at random. The scariest part is, it doesn’t even seem to have an agenda, just a desire to destroy as large an area as it can.

 

Those ones are the worst, because they can never really be talked out of what they’re doing, only taken out with as little damage as possible.

 

Even as we’re just setting out, the feeling of wrongness is apparent. The usual sounds of traffic, the clattering of trains, the barely-audible hum of bustling civilians is gone, replaced by distance sirens a much more urgent burble of panicked exclamations punctuated by screams and yells. Kitty squeezes more tightly onto me as we pick up speed, and I can feel the shift from “this is fun” to “game face”. Sure, being a superhero has its moments, but beating up thugs and stopping robberies is the fun part.

 

Stopping large-scale attacks with a high probability of fatalities is the serious business time, and the worst part is knowing you’re not there yet, so all you can do is frantically try to close the distance before anyone else gets hurt.

 

“What if we’re too late?” Kitty asks in my ear, voice barely audible over the air rushing past us.

 

“We can be late,” I say, “but if we even have a chance in hell of stopping this thing, we’re never _too_ late.”

 

“I hate that song,” she says with a nervous giggle.

 

“Me too,” I say, and she squeezes me again.

 

I can hear the various sounds of the others following behind us, the soft crunch of Bobby Drake’s ice surfing, the thrumming buzz of Flash’s electromagnetic flight, the steady _THWIP-THAWP_ of Riley and Gwen’s webbing, and the rhythmic _kreeng-SHOOM_ of MJ’s boosters carrying her from building to building. Johnny’s jet exhaust is nearly inaudible, and ever since he figured out how to turn his wings invisible, it’s been next to impossible to track him.

 

More and more, it feels like the Neighborhood Watch is just happening, and we’re trying to keep up with it.

 

Damn it, I just mentally acknowledged it as the Neighborhood Watch.

 

Fuck it.

 

We assemble on the nearest rooftop to the action, and it’s only through my goggles’ heat signature tracking that I see Johnny swoop down and stop a huge chunk of debris from crushing a car. MJ likewise skitters down to start ferrying people away from the battlefield, where we finally see what we’re up against.

 

“Oh…fuck,” Kitty breathes into my ear, still clinging tightly to me.

 

“Agreed,” I say.

 

In the middle of a fairly large intersection, a giant…thing is literally tearing up the street, ripping  out chunks of pavement and sending them flying. It’s enormous, big enough to give the Rhino a run for his money, but it doesn’t look cybernetic at all. It stands hunched, like a gargoyle, with thick-looking mottled hide in shades of murky green and brown. Sharp spikey plates jut out along its spine, continuing along a thick, lashing tail and all the way up to its neck. Its head is elongated, ending in a snapping beak that makes it look like some kind of….

 

“Stegosaurus,” Bobby Drake says from nearby. “Like a…stego-human hybrid or something.”

 

“That’s either a scientific miracle or the most disastrous success in bioscience history,” Gwen says.

 

“I’m gonna go with both,” I say.

 

“How do we take it down?” Kitty asks, still clutching tightly to me, and frankly, as dangerous as that thing looks, I’m content to keep her safe with me.

 

“Alright,” I say. “Okay, Widow and Iceman, do what you can to root it. Freeze it, web it to the ground, freeze and web the frozen bits to the ground, whatever. It’s…maybe reptilian, so if nothing else the cold should slow it. Electro, try to get in and zap it. Knock it out.”

 

“The beak,” Riley says. “Web its beak shut. It probably has a hell of a bite.”

 

“Good call,” I say. “Try to – “

 

“Web its tail down, too,” Riley says, looking at me, and beneath her newly designed mask, I can tell she has my sheepish smile on. “Sorry.”

 

“No, it’s a good plan,” I say. “Move out.”

 

“Got it!” Flash says as they take off.

 

“What are we doing?” Kitty asks, and Riley and I lock gazes again, and she nods.

 

“There’s always another,” she says, and my spider-sense clangs just as she speaks.

 

We leap away, Kitty screaming as I land on the edge of the building, turning to see a snarling, screeching creature where we just were. It looks almost like the lizard-men that attacked our school ages ago, but…bigger. The skin is smoother than the mottled plates of the stegosaurus guy, with a darker olive green shade and an obvious white belly. His digitigrade legs allow him to crouch in an animalistic manner as he glares at us from small, yellow eyes set in an elongated face, snapping a mouth lined with razor-sharp incisors. It’s almost like someone took the lizard idea those guys from the school used and replaced the lizard with a raptor from Jurassic Park.

 

“Hsssssclever sssspiderssss,” it says in a spitting hissing voice, crouching and studying us. “Hssssslook at yooouuuu. Jussssst asssssss the massssster predicted. Hsssssstelllll me girrrrlllll, hssssow are you adjusssssssting to your nyooooo hssssgender?”

 

“How do you know about that?” Riley asks in a heated voice, and I glance over at her. She instantly calms a bit at my look, as we both realize the same thing: he’s just trying to bait her. We’ve both read our share of thriller stories in the past, and whenever the bad guy alludes to knowing anything about the good guy, it’s a distraction ploy and nothing more.

 

“Hhhssssst! I knooooowww quite a bit hsssssabout you!” the Raptor says. “More hsssssteven than yoooouuu!”

 

“That’s fascinating,” Riley replies, holding her hands out.

 

_THWIP-THWIP!_

 

The Raptor snarls as his legs are bound, yanking his legs free and turning to leap at me. My spider-sense sounds in my head, but just as I’m about to jump, it goes quiet, and I’m befuddled long enough for the Raptor to nearly collide with me….

 

Before flying right through me.

 

“Hsssaaaaagh!” the Raptor yells as he soars over the side of a fifty-story building and plummets to the street below.

 

“What the fuck?” Riley eloquently points out, and Kitty giggles into my ear.

 

“Did I mention I can make other people intangible with me?” she says, and I let a snort through my nose, turning to see the Raptor colliding with the ground, leaving quite a crater.

 

He doesn’t get up.

 

“That was actually anticlimactic,” Riley says, and Kitty nods against my shoulder.

 

“Did he say ‘new gender’?” she asks.

 

“Later,” Riley says. “Let’s go help – “

 

Spider-sense! We both leap away, Kitty squeaking into my ear again and clinging tightly to me as I leap over the side of the building, webbing onto a water tower nearby and swinging across the street. I land on the opposite rooftop, listening to the snarling growl of the huge fellow in the street as it bellows out a gut-wrenching roar. I chance a small glance and see that its feet have been bound to the ground, and it’s swiping angrily at Bobby Drake as he soars in icy circles around it. A sudden flash of blue-white light tells me that Flash is doing his best to give the stego-guy a good zap.

 

No time to worry about that, though. A draconic figure with huge bat wings is soaring upward after apparently diving at us, looping and arcing toward Riley and I (featuring Kitty) again.

 

“Nnngraaaah!” it screeches, and its maw opens up as my spider-sense clangs again.

 

“Scarlet, get over here!” I yell, and Riley leaps to us. I reach out and clutch onto her. “Shadowcat, phase us!”

 

The world goes dark for a moment, and when my sight returns, and I’m in a fairly shabby-looking apartment as a rushing sound fills the air above us. Kitty sighs in relief, clutching onto me.

 

“S-sorry if I startled you,” she says. “I can phase us through fire, but the heat would have still hurt a lot. Um…unless he wasn’t about to shoot fire, in which case, I feel stupid.”  


“No, he definitely just shot a bunch of fire at us,” Riley says as smoke starts to fill the small apartment. “Let’s get out of here.”

 

“What the hell’s even going on, some kind of Jurassic Island of Dr. Moreau?” Kitty grumbles as we leap out a window.

 

“Sick reference,” I tell her, and she lets a pleased little giggle.

 

“Thanks,” she says. We land, but Kitty doesn’t climb down, apparently content to be our Danny Phantom intangibility defense for the moment. “Now, how are we beating Puff the Magic Dragon?”

 

“Pete,” Riley says from nearby, pointing to fire hydrant. “Water and zappy hands?”

 

“Worth a shot,” I say. “You work on it, and I’ll draw him in.”

 

From nearby, I hear a deafening roar as the stego-guy gets frustrated at something or other, but Gwen told me long ago that she doesn’t want me getting hurt because I’m too busy worrying about her, so I trust that she has it in hand as I fire a couple of impact webs at the dragon man.

 

_THWUP-THWUP!_

 

“Ngraaaah!” the Dragon Man yells as the heavy web-bullets collide with him. He doesn’t seem as verbose as the Raptor, content to roar and snarl as he leaps from the building he just set aflame before he tears down toward us. “Aaaagh!”

 

“Not much for conversation, is he?” Kitty observes, and I shake my head, backing toward the hydrant.

 

“Scarlet, how you doing?” I ask, and she grunts.

 

“It’s loose, but we’ll need a good – ooooh, okay,” she says, realizing what I have planned even as the idea fully forms in my head. “We’re good.”

 

“Get ready to phase us,” I tell Kitty, and she nods into my shoulder.

 

“Okay,” she says quietly, gripping onto me. The Dragon Man dives at us, growling, but before he can ready another gout of flame, I hold out my hands and web his mouth shut, Riley adding a few more webs for good measure. Snarling, the dragon settles for a diving attack, and I thank my lucky stars he’s just a fucking idiot.

 

“Now!” I say. Just as the dragon is about to collide with Kitty and me, we go intangible, and he sails right through us, crashing into the fire hydrant, which dislodges and sends an enormous gush of water into the sky. Dragon Man goes flying, carried away by the highly-pressurized water, and I hear a garbled snarling sound as he shrinks into the distance.

 

“Did I do good, coach?” Kitty says into my ear, and I chuckle.

 

“MVP,” I say. “Player of the year, here.”

 

……

 

Flash couldn’t believe his luck.

 

Yeah, this was hecking scary, and he really hoped no one was like dead or anything, but not only was he fighting alongside Spider-Man, it turned out that Spidey was none other than his pal from school, Peter Parker!

 

What were the odds?

 

“Electro, watch it!”

 

Gwen’s voice snapped him from his thoughts, and just as a giant stego-hand loomed above him, ready to smack him out of the way, he leapt away, time seeing to slow down as it tended to anytime he needed to go fast. Professor X said it was his electrically-enhanced reaction time making everything seem to move slower. The problem was, he could only use it when he was all the way to eleven, with pulsing blue skin and static zaps shooting out of him all the time, so it hardly helped him get around the X-Manor in any kind of a hurry.

 

Apparently, it was handy in a fight with a lumbering half-dinosaur monster bent on destroying everything in plain sight.

 

“Dude, you remember that game, like… _Rampage: Total Destruction_ , that’s what it’s called!” Bobby yelled as he skated by. “Remember that game?”

 

“That game is so fucking old, bro,” Flash said.

 

“But seriously, this guy looks like the – “

 

“Watch it!” Flash yelled, zipping up to hover between Bobby and the grabbing hand of Stegron, powering up a bolt and sending it arcing toward the monster’s hand.

 

“Ngrah!” it bellowed, snarling down at them and lunging with its beak.

 

“Got it!” Gwen said, leaping in faster than Flash could follow and webbing up Stegron’s beak. Flash still couldn’t believe that was Gwen Stacy. She was always such a sweet girl, and here she was, being a total badass.

 

Pete was one lucky bastard.

 

Stegron lunged, but its jaw strained against the webbing, opening half an inch before snapping shut.

 

“How strong is that stuff!?” Bobby asked, rearing his hand back and hurling a thick ice spear at Stegron, sending it staggering backward.

 

“We haven’t found a top limit yet,” Gwen said, aiming now at Stegron’s tail and latching that to the ground. “Electro, get on his neck and give him everything you’ve got, got it?”

 

“Fuck yeah!” Flash said, and time once again slowed down around him as he zipped up, feeling that strange buzzing sensation of his body shifting into a bolt of lightning (it did that sometimes) before he appeared right behind Stegron’s neck, zipping forward and wrapping his arms around it.

 

“Don’t you know!?” he yelled. “I’m Electro!”

 

……

 

_Fzzzzzt!_

 

With a blinding flash of white-blue light, Flash unloads what my goggles tell me is well over fifty-thousand volts into the stegosaurus guy’s body, and while that would be enough to vaporize anything smaller than a rhinoceros, the stego-fella just snarls and staggers, twitching as he falls to the ground. His tail lashes futilely at the air as he croons out a pained wail, groaning feebly before falling unconscious. I hurry over to see Flash in full Electro mode his skin a solid pulsing blue light as he fixes his washed-out white eyes on me and smirks.

 

“How’d I do?” he asks, eagerly, zooming over almost faster than I can track his movements. He bounces eagerly before me.

 

I just laugh. “Alright, you’re on the team, kid.”

 

He lets jubilant yell, doing a little jig on the spot. “Hella yea, Neighborhood Watch membership achieved!”

 

“Are we really calling it that?” Riley asks from behind me, and I shrug, turning to see her shaking her head.

 

“I think it’s out of our hands,” I say. “Too many people are calling it that. Besides, Widow, Jackpot, _and_ Firestar gave me the eyes.”

 

“Oh no, triple threat,” Riley says. “All hope is lost.”

 

“We just have to accept it,” I say, and I hear Kitty laughing softly over my shoulder. I glance over at her. “So…are you just stuck there?”

 

“I mean, if I get down, I’ll just have to climb back on to get back to…headquarters,” she says. “So, why not just stay here?”

 

“Feasible enough to work,” I say, and she huffs softly.

 

“You have like four girlfriends,” she says. “Let me have this moment where you’re kind of all mine for a little bit.”

 

“No comment,” I say firmly as Gwen hurries over, giggling softly when she sees Kitty clinging tightly to me.

 

“She’s gonna get stuck like that,” she says, and I shrug.

 

“Well, cats do like catching spiders,” I tell her, and Gwen and Kitty both burst into laughter.

 

“Alright, not even mad,” Gwen says. “That’s adorable.”

 

…….

 

“…crews are still working to clear the wreckage after a scene straight out of a Godzilla movie sprang up seemingly out of nowhere downtown,” the news anchor says on the screen. “Gerald Hancock is on the scene with more, Gerald?”

 

“Diane, it was a scene of chaos and terror just an hour ago, as right here, on the corner of Broadway and fourteenth street, three mutated creatures of some kind set out with seemingly only one goal: causing as much destruction as possible. The rampage was brought to a close only by the timely intervention of none other than Spider-Man, the Black Widow, and what seems to be a superpowered team of some kind. Amateur camera footage shows what looks like a young woman and man in armor blocking pedestrians from flying debris with energy shields, and Spider-Man, the Black Widow, new arrival the Scarlet Spider, and what appear to be three mutants engaging the creatures themselves.”

 

“Neighborhood Watch!” Harry yells triumphantly, pumping his fist as the news anchor continues to chatter on the television. We’re all lounging in the living room, Norman Osborn finally having given in and purchased a television for the main area. “Dude, that is so sick! I saw the live footage, and it was epic as fuck!”

 

“I guess we’re going with Neighborhood Watch,” Riley sighs, and I just shrug, rolling my eyes as I dig into my next slice of pizza.

 

“I’m over it, I guess,” I say. “We’re literally the only two that don’t like it.”

 

“And two weeks ago, we were the same person,” Riley adds quietly, and I snort.

 

“Are you seriously gonna eat a whole pizza yourself?” Kitty asks, sounding half-shocked, half-impressed.

 

“Uh, no,” I say. “I’m gonna eat two.”

 

“We burn a lot of carbs being spider-folks,” Riley says, digging into the second of her own stack of pizzas while Gwen daintily stuffs half a slice in her mouth on my other side.

 

Okay, it’s really not that dainty, but she’s my girlfriend, and she’s a precious little flower, so there.

 

“I yoothed a luh uh weh hing,” she says, and I laugh, kissing her pizza-stuffed cheek.

 

“You are perfect,” I tell her, and she quickly chews and swallows the pizza before smiling over at me.

 

“Aw, you little liar,” she says. “Anyway, I used a lot of webbing, so I’m like…starving. Harry, do you have brownies? I could like…really go for some brownies.”

 

“Brownies!” Harry shouts, jumping to his feet and taking off for the kitchen. “Jujube! Gwen wants brownies!”

 

“I heard her,” Jubilee says with a long-suffering smile at us before standing and following him.

 

“So, Pete, yo,” Flash says from nearby. “What’s up with the Neighborhood Watch? Are you starting a team?”

 

“Yeah, I wanna join!” Kitty says eagerly from down the couch.

 

“Same,” Bobby says. “You guys get all the fun, that was sick.”

 

“We’re…” I start before trailing off, glancing over at Gwen and Riley, who just shrug, then over to Jess on my other side. She smiles and gives me an encouraging little nod, her hand sliding over mine to rub her thumb over the back. I look back at the room, seeing Harry trot back in and toss a couple boxes of Little Debbie snack cakes at Gwen, who cheers.

 

“Yes!” she says, tearing the boxes open and digging in. “Pete, recruitment speech.”

 

Harry sits, Jubilee crawling into his lap, and I turn to the assembled group.

 

I guess now is as good a time as any?

 

“So, um…we wanna start a group,” I say. “I guess…most of you have probably already pieced this together. But…New York has been associated with danger and crime and gangs and stuff for too long. New York is supposed to be like the icon, the city that embodies hope and opportunity. And we’re gonna bring that back. We’ve been running around fighting bad guys that spring up, but now we’re gonna start rooting them out. We’re gonna take the fight to them, go looking for them, and bring them to justice.”

 

“Why can’t like the police do that, though?” Bobby asks. “I mean, I’m not knocking your idea, it sounds dope, but what about the cops?”

 

“Cops have to many people to answer to,” Gwen says, looking from her third package of Swiss Cake Rolls and fixing Bobby with a calm stare. “Warrants, procedure, probable cause, and the general anti-police crap going around the internet these days, and not to mention dirty cops that give these guys a free run for the right price. The officers that care are doing their best. Heck, we run into a lot that are actually glad we’re doing what we’re doing. But we don’t answer to anyone. We just want the bad guys put away for a long time.”

 

“And if we can’t pin anything on these guys, we can do our best to stop them, to tear down their operations and make it as hard as we can for them to keep going,” I say. “It costs money to rebuild a criminal empire, so if we can keep knocking it down faster than they can rebuild, that’s progress, at least.”

 

“I’m in,” Kitty says, nodding fervently. “We may only be able to help on like the weekends, but I’ll do what I can.”

 

“Same,” Jess says, hugging me tightly. “I’ll come around as often as I can, and once I rein in my powers better, I’ll be out there with you guys.”

 

“Well, I’m all for cleaning up the city with Spidey,” Flash says, grinning at me. “Peter Parker, man. Who woulda thought? I mean, I kinda thought, when you were talking to Professor X that day, but I was just like…I thought I was hearing things or something.”

 

“We’re gonna get voice modulators,” I insist. “I’m tired of people guessing who we are.”

 

“You gonna be like Darth Spider or something?” Bobby asks, and I snicker.

 

“Don’t tempt me.”

 

……

 

That night, as the party winds down, I find my way to one of Harry’s many guest rooms, having texted Aunt May and told her I’ll be spending the night at the penthouse.

 

**_From: Beloved Auntie_ **

 

_[Have fun, love. I’m going to the craft show tomorrow after church, so I might not be home when you get there.]_

**_To: Beloved Auntie_ **

****

_[I’ll just get Gwen to make me lunch ;)]_

**_From: Beloved Auntie_ **

_[Peter Parker, you’d better thank her at least.]_

**_To: Beloved Auntie_ **

_[I’ll thank her twice, once from me and once from you.]_

**_From: Beloved Auntie_ **

_[Good boy. :) Have fun with your friends sweetheart. Love you.]_

**_To: Beloved Auntie_ **

_[Love you too, Aunt May. Goodnight.]_

**_From: Beloved Auntie_ **

_[Goodnight, love.]_

 

“Texting Aunt May?” I hear Gwen ask as I sit cross-legged on one of the guest beds, and I look up to see her dropping her overnight bag to the floor, drawing out a large shirt that I specifically bought her for the purpose of being a “boyfriend shirt” that’s actually big enough to serve as a functional nightgown, since I’m not exactly big enough for my own shirts to do the same.

 

“Should I look away?” I ask, and she waves an airy hand.

 

“It’s nothing you haven’t seen before,” she says. “The only reason I’m wearing this thing to bed is in case anyone walks in on us.”

 

She starts to strip down, humming a little song as she does.

 

“So, did you have fun wearing Kitty as a backpack?” she asks, and I’m worried for half a second before I realize that her voice lacks the passive-aggressive tone that most boyfriends panic about when asked such a question. If nothing else, Gwen is one of the more understanding girlfriends, watching my borderline-flirtatious interactions with some girls with nothing more than a wry little smile.

 

“The intangibility thing saved my ass more than a few times,” I tell her, and she lets a soft little laugh.

 

“I should thank her for making sure you made it out in one piece,” she says, and again, her tone is amused but genuine. Sarcastic she may sound, but I don’t doubt she plans to actually find Kitty and thank her for her help in the fight. Gwen’s head pops out of the shirt as she pulls it over her head, and she sees the look I’m giving her.

 

“What?” she asks with a little smile, fixing her hair.

 

“I’m so lucky to have you,” I tell her. “You’re…you’re just so…understanding. I can tell you about these kinds of things like Kitty getting borderline flirty with me, and you’re just…. You don’t mind. You trust me, I guess.”

 

“Pete, of course I trust you,” Gwen says, taking a deep breath. “And, for the most part, I trust the girls that we know. And…that’s actually something I wanted to talk to you about.”

 

She has an uncharacteristically serious look on her face, and I nod, pulling her into a hug. She settles against me, looking up at me with wide, silvery-blue eyes.

 

“Pete, you love me, right?” she asks in a soft voice, and I instantly nod, squeezing her.

 

“Absolutely,” I say. “I love you, Gwen.”

 

She gives me a wide, warm smile, nestling into my arms.

 

“And you love Jess,” she says softly.

 

I freeze, and she turns in my arms to stare up at me. Her eyes, despite the soft warmth in their gaze, are determined as they look up at me.

 

“You do,” she insists, still with that same smile. “And you love MJ.”

 

“Gwen,” I say, shaking my head. “What…I mean, what are you getting at? Do I…apologize? Is this you breaking up with me in like a really mean way?”  


“No!” Gwen insists, eyes going wide as she presses herself against me and wraps me in a hug. “Oh, gosh, Pete, no. Of course not, never. Pete, please don’t ever think that, okay?”

 

I let a small laugh of relief and hug her back. “Sorry,” I say, smiling sheepishly. “Neurotic mess, remember?”

 

“Well…stop it,” Gwen says with a small giggle. “Pete, I would never ever break up with you. In…in fact, it’s pretty much the opposite.”

 

“Opposite?” I ask, glancing down at that perfect head of blonde hair, and she nods. “You’re…un-breaking up with me?”

 

“I’m…oh my gosh, Pete, this is…still just a whole lot of craziness for me to kind of sneak past you, so….” She heaves another little sigh. “So…you really like MJ, and you still love Jess, right? And if you didn’t have Jess or me around, you could probably love MJ, too, right?”

 

I really want to ask where she’s going with this, but Gwen seems to be having some kind of low-key anxiety attack as she asks me these questions, so I just rub her back and nod.

 

“Yeah,” I admit. I know it was probably painfully obvious by my earlier interactions with Jess that I still love her, and as for MJ, well…she is obviously into me that way, if that Valentine’s Day flower had anything to say about the situation. I could definitely see myself…with her that way, in another life, one without Gwen or Jess as key players.

 

“What would you think about…being able to show them the kind of affection we have?” Gwen asks. “I mean…like, have them be your…girlfriends, too?”

 

Wait…what?

 

Is this really happening? Johnny made the comment as an offhand joke, but is the harem actually going to be a thing?

 

Calm down, Pete. Maybe Gwen’s just worried about something stupid, like she thinks she’s not enough for me? Because that’s just completely untrue.

 

“Gwen…you don’t…I mean, if you’re doing this for me – “

 

“Pete,” she says, and her nervousness gives way to a smirk for a moment. “C’mon, you’re the center of _my_ universe, not _the_ universe. This is for all of us. There’s a lot of guilt and envy and regret getting thrown around between all four of us, so I feel like the best way to fix that is to…share. Because we’re also all really good friends, and this might even help us grow even closer.”

 

“So…you want to basically let MJ and Jess…be my girlfriends or something?” I ask, barely believing the words even as I say them. “Like…alongside you?”

 

“Yeah,” Gwen says, nodding. “Not much is actually gonna change, I think. It’s just, MJ and Jess will be able to do all the cute boyfriend-girlfriend stuff they want with you, and everyone’s happy for once.”

 

This is still…overwhelmingly strange. Sure, Gwen hasn’t exactly shown herself to be jealously possessive of me, but to be the complete opposite, willing to let MJ and Jess have the same sort of girlfriend privileges she herself gets?

 

That’s…generous of her, to say the very least.

 

“Look, I know it’s…it’s strange,” Gwen says. “It really is. And I know you’re probably thinking I’ve lost my mind or something, but I’ve thought about this a whole lot, and I…I’ll be maybe a bit jealous at first, but it’s not like it’s you going out and picking up some chick and making me deal with it. This is me knowing what it’s like to want you and not be able to have you. And those two are my best friends, so I really…I don’t want them to have to go through what I did, watching you be with someone else. Is…that okay with you? Can you do this?”

 

“I…I suppose I could give it a try,” I say. “This is…I mean, I just…treat them like they’re dating me, too?”

 

“Exactly,” Gwen says, nodding up at me with a bright smile. “Basically, I’m still your girlfriend, but so is Jess, and so is MJ.”

 

“Just them?” I ask, and Gwen nods.

 

“This is going to work,” she says, and it sounds more like she’s telling herself than me. “I mean, it’s not like you have a finite supply of love and affection you can give out. I bet there’s enough Peter Parker to go around.”

 

“Oh my gosh, make me sound like some sleazy lounge lizard,” I say, holding my hands up in a comical “settle down” motion. “Ladies, ladies, please, there’s plenty Pete to go around.”

 

“If you ever say that with any amount of sincerity, I will beat you,” Gwen says with a giggle, and I snort.

 

“I sure hope so.”

 

……

 

They were as ready as they would ever be. The team had been brought together, members had been outfitted, everyone had been briefed as to their mission. Not a single garble over the collective airwaves had given any indication that anyone knew what they were up to. All that was left now, Norman knew, was to act. Phase One was complete, and it was time to move forward, to really get something done.

 

“You alright?” Tony asked as the car the two were riding in sped through the night. They were on their way to…somewhere. Apparently, only Agent Coulson knew the actual location. Stories had been fabricated, excuses made to their various employers and superiors. They all had a month. One month to find out the extent of Hydra’s influence in the United States and if they could, the rest of the world as well.

 

“I’m ready to get to work,” Norman said. “And I’m…disappointed that I only got to see Harry for a short time.”

 

“Well, when you get back, maybe you two can plan some father-son fishing time,” Tony said. “Hop in the family chopper, dangle a hundred on a string, see if anyone grabs on? Sounds like a good premise for a reality show, actually. Affluenza Fishing Adventures? I’d watch it.”

 

“You’d executive produce it,” Norman shot back with a smirk, and Tony shook his head.

 

“I don’t share credits,” he said. “It’s Producer or nothing.”

 

Norman just chuckled, but before he could say anything, the car pulled to a stop, and their pleasantly stoic driver turned back to them.

 

“This is it,” he said.

 

“Thank you,” Norman said, opening his door and stepping out as Tony did the same. They had only just closed their doors when the car made a quick U-turn and sped off, leaving them standing at what appeared to be little more than an old industrial shipyard.

 

“Picturesque,” Tony said, glancing around. Norman turned back to the docks, spinning and strolling toward the edge. It was late, well past midnight, and already a thick fog had rolled in, but Norman knew what was waiting in the mist. Well, he knew _something_ was waiting, something big. As he neared the edge of the docks, lights sprang up in the haze. First one pinprick of glowing white light, then another, then two more, then dozens at a time, stretching off in both directions, indicating that something nearly incomprehensibly large was lurking in the water.

 

The helicarrier.

 

Norman often wondered how Nick Fury and Phil Coulson kept these sorts of endeavors a secret from interested parties, but he knew that asking either of them would be a useless effort.

 

“That what I think it is?” Tony asked, strolling up behind Norman.

 

“It is, indeed,” Norman said with a half-smile, folding his arms over his chest. Yes, the time for planning was over. They’d spend enough time _explaining_ their plants to interested parties, recruiting them to their cause. It was time to put that cause to action, to call the troops to the battlefront.

 

It was time to assemble.


	6. Chapter 6

I awaken to the sound of an explosion.

 

Thankfully, it’s on a television, from the sounds of things, and it’s shortly followed by the sound of Flash yelling obscenities at aforementioned television.

 

“Aw, fuck that guy! Where did he get that!?”

 

“Raiders can have the Fat Man now,” Harry’s voice says.

 

“Cheap as fuck,” Flash says. “What do I do?”

 

“Try not to get blown up?” Bobby suggests.

 

“Damn, I guess I better give that a shot.”

 

“Harry, watch the volume, jeez!” Gwen’s voice calls.

 

The deafening sound of a rousing game of Fallout 4 lowers significantly, and moments later, as I’m stretching and flopping back to the mattress before reaching over for my phone, MJ peeks into the room.

 

“Aw, we did wake the princess,” she says with a little smile, slipping in and shutting the door. She’s still in her PJs, a pale purple pair of shorts that show off all of the great work the track team has done for her legs, and a pink tank-top that clings to her without being indecently tight. As she approaches with an uncharacteristically shy smile, the conversation with Gwen from last night comes back to me, and my eyes go wide.

 

“There it is,” she says, giggling as she crawls onto the mattress, leaning back onto her heels and kneeling next to me. “Gwen said she talked to you about her little scheme last night? And…and you were into it?”

 

“I’m gonna guess we had about the same reaction,” I say.

 

“Complete shock?”

 

“That’s the one.”

 

“But…as weird as it is, we’re…gonna try to make it work, right?” she asks, leaning over me, her red hair brushing against my nose. She smells like apricots and vanilla.

 

It’s a good scent.

 

“Yeah, I…I guess we are,” I say, and she smiles, leaning in and cupping my face, our noses brushing together.

 

“So, if I gave you a good-morning kiss?” she asks with a toothy smile.

 

“Well, I’d say that’s a pretty great way to start a morning,” I say, and she hums happily as her lips press against mine.

 

It tastes like Starbucks, and her lips (and tongue, slow down, MJ) are rather warm, so she probably was just drinking some coffee. She makes a small noise of what could be relief as she lingers, most likely savoring the moment before pulling away, grinning down at me.

 

“Okay, so…um, Gwen says to get ready, and then we’re making breakfast in the kitchen,” she says, bouncing to her feet. “I’m gonna go, because I’m like about to freak out a little.”

 

She scampers from the room, twiddling her fingers in one last wave as I sit up and wonder what I’ve gotten myself into. I realize I’m still holding my phone and swipe to take a look, but seeing as I spent the evening with most of my social circle, there’s not much other than a few Facebook status updates from Flash and Bobby and a slew of Tweets talking about our rather epic (a word I only use if it’s appropriate) party last night.

 

Alright, we actually just played Rock Band most of the night, be we did find out that Riley has an amazing singing voice, which was pretty pleasing for her to discover.

 

She needs all the little cheerful moments she can get.

 

There’s little else from my admittedly small social circle, though I do notice something interesting. Jess has changed her last name on her Facebook page. She’s liked the string of statuses I posted over the course of the night, but the name next to her picture is Jessica Jones.

 

Curious.

 

I head out into the hall, and over to the bathroom. Hello, fancy-ass rich person shower. Nice to see you again. After a quick but amazing shower (seriously, that is just an excessive amount of showerheads), I step out and head over to the small closet where I keep a supply of clothes stashed for occasions just such as this. In minutes, I’m toweled off and dressed, ready for a relaxing Sunday.

 

Just as I’m emerging from the steamy confines of the bathroom, I run into Jess.

 

“Pete, there you are,” she says with a bright smile. “Oh, hey, c’mere.”

 

And she’s kissing me, like we never broke up, like she was never gone. She presses against me, her hands running down my chest like they always did when we kissed, like it’s not enough to just be kissing, she has to be in as much contact as possible while still keeping it halfway decent.

 

She slowly pulls away, obviously reluctantly. “I’ve been wanting to do that for so long,” she confesses quietly, smiling up at me. “I missed it. I missed you.”

 

“I missed you, too,” I say, squeezing her. “I’m glad you’re back, even if you’re all the way out in Jersey.”

 

“It’s better than being all the way in Ohio,” she says, bumping her head against my chest. “This way, I can visit you every single weekend and…relive the good old days.”

 

“Or make some new good old days to relive when we’re actually old enough to do that kind of thing,” I say, and she nuzzles into my shirt.

 

“I like the way you think,” she says, stepping away and dragging me toward the kitchen. “Hey, come get some breakfast. We’re teaching Harry how to make omelets.”

 

“Why does Harry wanna know how to make omelets?” I ask, utterly confused.

 

“Because ‘Jujube’ mentioned how much she loves a good omelet, and Harry’s so completely in love with her that now it’s his mission to learn how to make one,” Jess says, giggling. “It’s actually cute.”

 

“Belgian waffles,” I say as we walk, and she smiles back at me.

 

“You remembered,” she says, sounding pleased.

 

“Of course,” I tell her. “Before you left, I was actually considering buying this big-ass Belgian waffle maker and taking it for a spin.”

 

“Well, now that you’re a super-rich tech designer for Oscorp, you have no reason not to,” she says, and I nod.

 

“Fair point,” I say as we head downstairs. “Hey, why are you Jessica Jones now?”

 

She blinks. “Oh yeah, forgot about that,” she says. “Mom and Dad are gonna make the divorce official, and Mom’s taking her maiden name. She said Phil and I could take it, too, and I’m like…fuck that guy and his name. Besides, Jessica Jones sounds so much more badass, doesn’t it?”

 

“Like the beautiful but deadly love interest in a noir drama,” I say. “With like a red dress with a slit up the leg, a mink scarf and one of those long cigarette things. And a revolver, of course.”

 

“Do I smell another movie trailer?” Jess asks, and I chuckle at the memory of our first date.

 

“Some sexy saxophone music,” I say, “Maybe a gruff male voiceover, like, ‘She blew into my life like a hurricane, but with the kinda trouble she caused, I’ll take some nasty weather any day.’”

 

“That’s actually really good,” Jess says, and I shrug.

 

“Uncle Ben loved those old radio dramas,” I tell her. “I showed him how to look them up on YouTube once, and I swear, he spent a good month listening to them nonstop.”

 

“That is too adorable,” Jess says, hugging me again. She pulls me to a stop just outside the kitchen, kissing my jaw. “One more?”

 

“I don’t see why not,” I say before leaning in and planting another quick kiss on her lips. She pulls away, giving me a warm smile, but I think some of the apprehension I’m feeling shows in my face, because it fades to a thoughtful look.

 

“You okay?” she asks, and I nod.

 

“Yeah, this is all just…strange,” I say. “It’s a good strange, but still….”

 

“The good boyfriend part of you feels creepy about kissing other girls,” Jess says, and I nod.

 

“Pretty much,” I say.

 

“I mean, if that’s the only problem we’ve had so far, this is going really well,” Jess says, squeezing my hand in both of hers. “You’re just dealing with a bit of an adjustment period.”

 

The door to the kitchen opens, and Gwen’s head pokes out, taking in the sight of us before a smile spreads on her face.

 

“Morning, sleeping beauty,” she says, stepping out and wrapping me in a hug. “Last in line for a kiss, I guess?”

 

She plants a kiss on my lips, giggling as she pulls away.

 

“Yeah, we got a little greedy,” Jess says, smiling sheepishly. “Sorry, Gwen.”

 

She just waves the apology off, gesturing for the door. “MJ’s challenging you to an onion-chopping contest. First one to cry does dishes or something?”

 

“Oh, it’s on,” Jess says, giving my hands one last little squeeze before disappearing into the kitchen, leaving Gwen and me alone. She steps in and wraps me in another hug.

 

“You alright?” she asks into my ear. “You’re not freaking out _too_ bad, are you?”

 

“You know me so well,” I tell her, and she lets a single little laugh.

 

“Home-field advantage,” she says. “We may have this little setup going on now, but I still grew up with you.”

 

“Are you seriously okay with this?” I ask her, and she rolls her eyes.

 

“Pete, this was _my_ idea,” she insists. “I…I’m gonna miss having you all to myself, but those two love you, too, maybe even as much as I do, and if they don’t, they will soon enough. There’s something you have, a spark or something, and I can either let them try to find someone else that even compares to you or just…share you and have something really special between all of us.”

 

“You’re pretty amazing, Gwen,” I tell her, and she hunches her shoulders a bit, giving me a sweet little smile.

 

“You’re pretty alright, yourself, Peter Parker,” she says, and I snort.

 

“Hey, c’mon, I’m more than alright,” I insist, tackle-hugging her into the kitchen, and she squeals playfully.

 

“Help, Spider-Man has gone rogue and is attacking me!” she says with stilted mock-drama. In the kitchen, Jess and MJ are dumping their chopped onions into a bowl, watching amusedly as Gwen plants her feet and valiantly resists my onslaught. “Save me, Jackpot!”

 

MJ runs over and laughs as she latches her arms around my sides, tugging at me, and while she has no chance at budging me in any real capacity, I humor her and play along, falling backward into her.

 

“Oof!” she squeaks, collapsing under me, but I spin and catch her, pulling her to her feet. “Heh, I guess _I_ hit the jackpot this time.”

 

“Face it, Tiger,” I tell her, and she gasps, blushing red.

 

“You can’t say that like that,” she whines. “It’s so hot.”

 

“You just hit the jackpot,” I say with my best smirk. She fans herself, hurrying back to help with the next round of omelets.

 

“Gwen, make him not do that anymore!” she calls over her shoulder.

 

“Peter, stop overstimulating MJ, her delicate sensibilities can’t handle it,” Gwen says, and I chuckle. The other door to the kitchen opens, and Harry strides in from the dining room.

 

“Yo, Pete!” he says. “I’m the omelet king. I’m gonna start a cooking show called Omelet You Finish.”

 

“Solid pun-work,” I say appreciatively.

 

“Thought you’d like that,” he says. “Next one’s for you. Bacon and cheddar.”

 

“With extra bacon?” I ask, and he quirks an eyebrow at me.

 

“C’mon, who are you talking to?” he asks. “I’m gonna make your arteries remember this day with horror.”

 

“Challenge accepted,” I say.

 

“Alright, if you’re not helping with omelets, skedaddle,” MJ says, ushering me toward the door. “Go watch Flash die for the thirtieth time.”

 

“War never changes,” I say with a nod, and she sneaks a quick kiss when Harry’s distracted with Jess’s instructions.

 

“Get out of here, or I might chop at my fingers because you’re distracting me,” she says in a low voice, and I grin at her as I step out into the dining area, where Lana, Johnny, and Riley are sitting at the table, Riley powering through what looks like her third omelet with one hand while she taps away at my laptop with the other. I wonder what she’s designing at first, but a closer glance shows that she’s playing a Pokémon emulator.

 

“Pokémon?” I ask, settling into the seat next to her, and she shrugs.

 

“I _was_ doing some work on Harry’s mask,” she says. “I might have a workable design for the voice modulators we were thinking about. But Gwen told me I needed a break from all of that, so I’m playing Pokémon, and these two are making sure I don’t do anything else.”

 

“You play Pokémon like Sue,” Johnny says, shaking his head. “I don’t think she’s lost a battle yet. And she plays online against, like…people who devote their lives to that perfect team or whatever.”

 

“Oh, hey, speaking of perfect team,” Riley says, pausing her game, “Harry and I talked a bit about the stuff we’re gonna need for the Neighborhood Watch.”

 

“Big huge bulletin board?” I ask, and she shakes her head.

 

“See, I was thinking the same thing,” she tells me. “But Harry said we should get a giant, like…eighty-inch touch-screen computer monitor. Put up a huge map of New York and set up a program to track our missions and stuff.”

 

“Right,” I say. “When are we gonna have time to design a program like that?” It’s doable, for sure, but between designing new armor for Harry, fine-tuning Baymax’s programming, and now creating voice modulators for the team, there’s just not much time left.

 

“Actually, Kitty volunteered,” Riley says.

 

“Kitty?”

 

“Kitty.”

 

“Kitty _Pryde_?”

 

“I’m with you,” Riley says, shrugging. “But she went on this like two-minute in-depth explanation of how she could do it, and she actually lost me for a moment with some of her computer jargon. That girl _really_ knows computers.”

 

“Huh,” I say. “Color me surprised.”

 

“I know, right?” she says. “So, for once, we don’t actually have to do something.”

 

“Neato,” I say, settling into a seat next to her and spotting Lana nursing a cup of coffee, taking a drink. “Not a morning person, Lana?”

 

“Couldn’t sleep,” she grumbles, and I lean across the table.

 

“Everything alright?” I ask, and she looks up at me with a little snort.

 

“As alright as my life can be,” she says. “It’s not something I really wanna talk about, ‘kay?”

 

“Well…when you do, I’m a pretty good listener,” I tell her. She fights back a smile, nodding and going back to her coffee as the kitchen door opens, Harry bursting through with a sight that makes me facepalm, laughing into my hand.

 

“Breakfast is muthafuckin’ served!” he says, setting down the plate, which has not one but three admittedly well-crafted omelets all stacked in a neat pile. He even made each one different, the bottom one the classic bacon and cheddar, the middle one chicken and chopped peppers with pepper-jack cheese, the top one ham and Colby-jack.

 

“Omelet king, here,” I say, and Harry presents me grandiosely with a fork.

 

“I made them,” he says. “Omelet you finish ‘em off.”

 

“Well-played,” I tell him, taking the fork and digging in.

 

“Alright, cleanup detail, bucko,” MJ says, ushering him back into the kitchen. “That’s enough omelet puns for one year.”

 

“What eggs-actly do you mean by – “

 

“Enough!”

 

……

 

After we’re all finished with breakfast, the guests start to trickle out, Lana bowing out first after a few texts from her foster home. Johnny leaves shortly after, admitting that he does still have an essay to finish before school tomorrow.

 

“Don’t be surprised if I spam you on Facebook for help,” he says with a look at Riley, who just blinks but smiles, shrugging.

 

“I don’t really have anything else going on except boring design stuff, so sure,” she says, and Johnny winks at her, waving at the rest of us as he goes and leaving behind a glowing Riley, who seems pleased at having someone specifically looking to _her_ for help.

 

Go, Johnny.

 

Soon enough, Kitty gets a chirping text message from the X-Men, looking up at the rest of us.

 

“The Blackbird is on the way,” she says with a sad little smile. “We should probably pack it in.”

 

“Noooo,” Jess says, hugging onto me. “I’m not readyyyy.”

 

“Oh, hey, Pete,” Gwen says, turning to me and placing a hand on my knee, giving it a little squeeze. “You never showed Jess how your spider-goggles work. Weren’t you gonna show her that?”

 

I don’t recall saying something like that, and Jess looks mildly confused before a blush suffuses her face, and I realize what Gwen’s going for.

 

“Yeah, I guess I forgot,” I say, standing and pulling her with me. She smiles and follows me out of the room, shooting Gwen a grateful look.

 

It was apparently agreed that we would be hiding this little arrangement from most of our friends until we had settled into it ourselves, which means I’m basically sneaking around with Jess and MJ, but with Gwen’s explicit permission.

 

“I’m not gonna lie, it’s kind of exciting to sneak this around everyone else,” Jess says softly, pulling me into the room I slept in last night and pressing herself against me, kissing me soundly on the lips.

 

“I was thinking the same thing,” I say, leaning back in for another. “It helps that this is Gwen-sanctioned, so it’s not cheating.”

 

“Trust me, this wouldn’t be happening otherwise,” Jess says, giggling and kissing my neck, hugging me and pressing me against the wall for another round of those searing kisses she’s so good at, and I lose a bit of time in the intensity of her warmth, her scent.

 

“Mmmmm, Pete, stop it,” she whines, pulling away and pouting up at me.

 

“I’m not doing anything,” I insist with what’s probably a dopey smile.

 

“You’re making me wanna stay here forever,” she huffs, and I chuckle, cupping her cheek.

 

“You can come back as much as you want,” I tell her. “But for now, you need the X-Men. Your power is pretty awesome, but it’s also – “

 

“Dangerous,” she says, nodding. “Heard that one before. Once I rein it in, though, they won’t be able to keep me off you.”

 

She steps back in and hugging me, kissing me softly again.

 

“Looking forward to it,” I tell her.

 

There’s a soft knock on the door, and MJ pokes her head in, giggling at the sight of us and fixing me with an impish look that tells me I may have bitten off more than I can chew with this whole thing.

 

“Um, the jet is here, and…you might wanna primp a little, Jess,” she says.

 

Jess looks down and gasps, fixing her rumpled clothes and giving me a sheepish look.

 

“Miss you already,” she says. “Walk me to the door?”

 

“Like you even have to ask,” I say, offering her my arm and leading her downstairs, MJ grabbing onto the other one. We reach the front door, and Jess turns to give me one last hug before making her way over to the others.

 

“See ya, Pete!” Flash says.

 

“Nice meeting you, Spidey,” Bobby adds.

 

“I’m going to add you on Facebook,” Kitty promises, looking at the others. “All of you, actually. I need friends that aren’t X-Men.”

 

“Aw, that hurts, Kit-Kat,” Bobby says.

 

“Bobby, if you call me that again, I’ll brick your computer,” she says before the door shuts, Jess blowing me one last kiss before it clicks shut.

 

“I like that guy Bobby,” Harry says. “He wants to go skateboarding sometime.”

 

“Three-way skate date?” I ask, and Harry grins.

 

“You fucking know it,” he says, and Jubilee clears her throat from next to him. “Oh, wait, four-way. Jujube wants to learn.”

 

“Well, you guys can run off and do that next weekend,” I say, heading over to the couch and settling onto it. “I had fun, but parties are exhausting.”

 

“Spoken like a true introvert,” MJ says, settling in on my left while Gwen plops down on my right. Harry collapses into a chair nearby and Jubilee daintily settles onto his lap. Riley looks a little forlorn before Gwen pats the spot on her other side. She settles in, and Gwen gently rubs her back, pulling her into a little snuggle on the couch.

 

“So, the Neighborhood Watch is happening,” Harry says, sounding excited. “What’s our first order of business?”

 

I lean back into the couch, and MJ leans against me like it’s the most normal thing in the world. At the very least, Harry and Jubilee don’t make a fuss out of it.

 

“We should…get a lay of the land, really,” I say. “Gwen probably knows a bit from her dad, but he’s probably not about to give us details about ongoing investigations or something, right?”

 

“Dad loves me, but he’s not willing to break the law unless it’s life-or-death stuff,” Gwen says, shrugging.

 

“Right,” I say. “We need someone who knows about the criminal underbelly but isn’t completely evil.”

 

“Oh no,” Riley mutters at the same time that I realize exactly who I’m talking about. Gwen looks at her and then me, then I notice her eyes widen as she realizes who we’re thinking of.

 

“Pete…no way,” she says sternly.

 

“She’s the only one that can give us a decent start at this,” I insist.

 

“Yo, who we talking about?” Harry asks, and Gwen just sighs.

 

“The Black Cat.”

 

……

 

Before we visit Felicia, though, there’s a day of school to take care of, and while I normally consider school my routine “muggle” life, it’s Riley’s first day of school as a girl. As we approach the campus, I remember my own tendency to internalize my own angsty moments so as not to impose on others. I stop Riley, and she gives me a resigned look as I turn to Gwen, who looks at us curiously.

 

“Go ahead and meet everyone else,” I say, glancing down at my clone. “I think we need to talk.”

 

“You sure?” she asks. “What’s going on?”

 

“I need to give me a pep talk,” I say. Gwen just quirks an eyebrow, shrugging and turning to head for the end of the alley we landed in.

 

“Have fun talking to yourself,” she says, strolling away. I turn to Riley, who smiles up at me.

 

“I know what you’re gonna say – “

 

“Well, then you know that I’m only saying it because I – “

 

“You care,” she says. “I get it. I’d…care about someone in my situation.”

 

“So why should I care any less about you just because you’re…you or…me?”

 

“I feel like I’m losing my…my…identity,” Riley says, and her eyes shine as she stares up at me. “I just…I hate this. I hate it so much, but I have to put on a brave face, because everyone in…my life isn’t actually in _my_ life. They’re in _your_ life. I try to talk to them or be friends with them, and they just…they don’t know how to _deal_ with me.”

 

“Riley,” I say, and she looks back to me, biting her lip. I wrap her in a hug, and she sobs into my chest. “Hey, hey, just…. Alright, let it out. I wish I could tell you everything will be okay, but all I can say is I’m here for you, okay? I’m glad you’re here. You listen – “

 

“I’m listening, you sappy idiot,” she grumbles, and I chuckle.

 

“I’m here for you,” I say. “I know I’d be having a full-on existential crisis in your shoes, so I understand a little bit of what you’re dealing with. But if you ever need someone to sympathize with you, I mean…I’m the most qualified.”

 

She pulls away, staring up at me with watery eyes. “I think…I’ll be alright,” she says, taking a deep breath and exhaling. “I just need to meet some people as Riley. People that don’t really know Peter. That’s why I signed on for some classes that I…that we weren’t in before.”

 

“I was wondering why you went for computer classes,” I tell her, and she smirks, wiping her eyes and making an attempt to recover herself. “I mean, we could probably build our own rig at this point.”

 

“Maybe I’ll meet a cute girl that’s into nerdy chicks?” she asks with a shrug.

 

“We can only hope,” I tell her, and she smiles.

 

“I’m glad…. Ugh, I can’t really say anything without sounding like a total narcissist,” she says.

 

“It’s just the two of us,” I say, and she snorts.

 

“I’m glad I’m such a nice guy,” she says before shuddering. “Ew, okay, I’m not saying that ever again.”

 

“Fair enough,” I say, gesturing toward the school. “Wanna get back before they start to think we’re making out?”

 

“Ew, no, ew, not—ew,” she winces, and I can’t help but burst into laughter as we walk.

 

……

 

Cindy Moon didn’t like to consider herself one to dwell on things.

 

Okay, so she held onto her little crush on Peter Parker for a few months, but once it became clear that he had an _abundance_ of girls in his life that were quite interested in him, she made herself get over it. If he walked up to her this very day and asked her out, she would probably say yes, sure, but she wasn’t pining after him.

 

Cindy Moon did not _pine_.

 

So when she looked upon the new girl that stepped into her Introductory Microsoft Office class, she only noted her _extreme_ similarities to Peter Parker out of a purely academic interest, and certainly not because of latent “crush” feelings she still had toward the rather adorable boy from her Journalism class.

 

And when she met eyes with the girl and not-so-subtly glanced at the empty seat to her right, it wasn’t to _encourage_ her to take said seat. And really, if it was, was it so bad for her to take a humanitarian interest in the new girl, to make sure she didn’t flounder helplessly in this strange new class in this strange new school, with her beautiful baby-blue eyes?

 

Alright, she needed to calm down. Last she checked, Cindy was very straight. Right?

 

“Um, hey,” the new girl said, sitting next to her.

 

“Hi,” Cindy said, and for all of her mental freaking-out, she managed to keep her cool outwardly, at least. “I’m Cindy.”

 

“Riley,” the girl said, smiling over at her like she’d been caught in some lie and knew she was about to be called out on it. Cindy wasn’t sure she could possibly be lying about, though.

 

All she saw was a rather sweet-looking girl that seemed like she could really use a friend.

 

“Nice to meet you, Riley,” she said with a bright smile, which Riley returned in kind.

 

“Likewise,” she said. “I’m kinda…in the market for some friends, so this might be a bit presumptuous, but….”

 

“Hey, we can be friends,” Cindy said with a warm smile. “Unless I find out that you’re like secretly the moderator of some neo-Nazi white supremacist blog somewhere.”

 

“Holy shit, what kind of people do you meet at this place?” Riley asked with a dubious laugh, and Cindy grinned at her.

 

“I’m not saying we get a ton of those types here, but you can never be too careful with the new ones,” she said, and Riley got a sad sort of smile on her face.

 

“Fair point,” was all she said, and Cindy studied her.

 

“You okay?” she asked. “Sorry if I like hit a nerve there. Just trying to make a buncha stupid jokes, make you feel more welcome, I guess.”

 

“No, no, it’s fine,” Riley said. “I’m just…a little out of my element, I guess. I had a lot of friends at my last school, and it’s…. I’m trying to get used to a place where no one knows who I am.”

 

“Well, hey, I know who you are,” Cindy said with a smile. “And I don’t really know you, but you seem pretty cool.”

 

Riley seemed strangely pleased to hear that, giggling nervously but looking relieved. “That’s…awesome to hear, for real,” she said. “Sorry, I’m being weird.”

 

“Only a little,” Cindy said, shrugging. “And really, who isn’t a little weird these days?”

 

“True,” she said, looking up at Cindy again, and wow, her eyes were pretty.

 

“Um…are you related to…Peter Parker, by chance?” Cindy asked.

 

“He’s my cousin,” Riley said in an automatic voice, and Cindy internally winced; she’d probably heard that question a thousand times today. “We…look a lot alike, I guess.”

 

“Not too many people have the baby-blues,” she said. “But you probably hear that so often that it’s just annoying, so I’ll drop it?”

 

She looked about to say something when Mr. Becker, the teacher, walked in. He quickly took attendance, stopping for a moment on Riley’s name to scribble her into the roster, and simply told the class that she’s new and to help her out.

 

Riley seemed glad that there wasn’t too much attention called to her presence.

 

“Everyone get to work, keep the conversations down, and if I catch any of you trying to get past the content blockers again, you will be summarily suspended,” Mr. Becker said, making his way over to Cindy and Riley. “Miss Benson, just keep up as well as you can. This is a work-at-your-own-pace class, but we do track your progress at the end of each week. If you feel comfortable jumping right in, we’re on page 176 of the workbook.”

 

“I think I can handle it,” Riley said with a small smile that told Cindy she was probably the computer-savvy type that would blast through the whole year’s work in a month if she wanted.

 

That worked in Cindy’s favor, at least; she was as computer-literate as the next millennial, but some of the intricacies made her head spin. Mr. Becker left them to their work, walking around the room and making sure everyone stayed at least reasonably on-task.

 

“So, you know a lot about computers?” she asked Riley, who gave a small sort of shrug.

 

“Enough to get by,” she said, opening up her workbook and studying the page she’d been told about. Cindy couldn’t help but notice the breathy little nose-laugh she gave at the work, though.

 

Yeah, she definitely knew a bunch about this stuff.

 

“So, where are you from?” Cindy asked, and Riley glanced over at her.

 

“Ohio,” she said quickly, a little too quickly, but maybe she got asked that question a lot and just generally had the answer ready.

 

Cindy sometimes needed to stop thinking like the reporter she only dreamed of being. Just because this girl was acting a little skittish, she wasn’t some kind of mysterious transfer student like in her manga. She was probably just nervous and not accustomed to overly-curious girls getting up in her business just because she bore an uncanny resemblance to her cousin and transferred in strangely close to the end of the school year.

 

Okay, it was a _little_ strange.

 

“Um…my mom…recently passed away, and I got sent to live with my Aunt May,” Riley went on. “She and Pete are the only family I have left.”

 

Well, now she just felt like crap.

 

“I’m sorry to hear about your mom,” Cindy said, pouting at her. “My grandma left us a year ago. I know it’s not quite the same as a parent, but….”

 

“No, um…I get it,” Riley said with a smile. “I’m just glad I found Aunt May and Peter. I just met them, but they seem like good people.”

 

“Peter’s pretty great,” Cindy said with a giggle. “But I’m glad you at least have a supportive family to fall back on.”

 

She got a warm, genuine smile at that, nodding. “Yeah,” she said. “My family’s pretty awesome.”

 

They spent the rest of the class in companionable silence, Riley affirming Cindy’s suspicions that she was quite the tech-savvy girl in the way she jumped right into the coursework like she’d been in the class all year. Even Mr. Becker stopped to commend her on adapting quickly.

 

That was nothing suspicious in and of itself, but Cindy couldn’t shake the feeling that there was something…off about this girl. Her parents had always told her she had “an investigative streak”, which she supposed was their polite way of telling her she was a bit nosy. Riley was nervous, which was understandable, being in a new school, but she was also a bit shifty, sort of like the other recent addition, Lana. Both of them seemed to have pasts that they weren’t keen on talking about, and Cindy was torn between her desire to know all of the gritty details and…well, normal human decency which told her that people were entitled to their secrets as long as those secrets weren’t harming anyone.

 

She supposed her interest in Riley was only compounded by her resemblance to her former crush, which was further complicated by the fact that she wasn’t really into girls.

 

She didn’t think so, at least.

 

The bell rang, and she realized she’d spent the entire class staring at her computer screen, having gotten none of her work done.

 

Great.

 

Well, she was a week ahead, anyway, but she wished she could have reached some kind of conclusion rather than think herself in circles about the oddities that had been surrounding her lately.

 

After a mostly-uneventful lunch, she made her way to her Journalism class, strolling along behind Peter Parker himself, who was chatting with his latest admirer, the enigmatic Lana Baumgartner.

 

Another subject for investigation. What was he _doing_ to get all of these girls (Cindy herself having been one of them) to instantly crush on him?

 

“…dering why you wouldn’t say something,” Peter could be heard saying as she got closer. “I mean, okay, it’s not actually my business, but I do care about you, Lana.”

 

“Why are you suddenly all super into my shit like that?” Lana asked, though she didn’t sound upset, just incredulous. “We didn’t exactly hit it off the first time we met. I was actually a total bitch to you.”

 

“Because I know that under that harsh exterior is a heart of gold?” Peter offered, and Lana just snorted.

 

“Oh, fuck off,” she said back, though her voice was amused and, Cindy noted, tinged with affection.

 

“For real, though, Lana, you’re…you’re pretty awesome,” Peter said, smiling over at her. “I know that you have kind of a…troubled past, and I just wanna help you.”

 

His tone was so sweetly earnest that Cindy found herself hoping Lana’s reply wasn’t a caustic insult, even if she had no idea what they were actually discussing. Lana hunched her shoulders, clenching her fists, then just as suddenly slumped, shaking her head.

 

“Alright, I’m sorry,” she said. “I just…didn’t wanna be any more trouble, I guess.”

 

“Friends help each other through this kind of stuff,” Peter said. “I promise, we’ll deal with this together, ‘kay? Promise me no more secrets like this.”

 

She smirked over at him. “Well, I have to have one or two secrets,” she said as they stepped into the classroom, leaving Cindy to wait at the door so they didn’t get the (very correct) impression that she had been eavesdropping on them.

 

So, Lana was going through some kind of turmoil and had neglected to tell Peter? It sounded like they’d known each other before she started at school, but they hadn’t made a point of advertising that fact.

 

Ugh, being nosy sucked; all of this information, and she could hardly go up to Peter and ask him “Hey, what did Lana mean about the first time you met?” without sounding like a total creep.

 

Which, okay, she probably was, to some degree. She just had a natural curiosity! It was why she wanted to be a reporter.  Thankfully, she drew the line at actual sleuthing unless something needed finding out, like the time she caught some members of the football team stealing nitrous oxide canisters from the chemistry lab to huff at a party one night.

 

That had been fun.

 

But she also had a tendency to eavesdrop without even realizing she was doing it, and before she knew it, she was sitting through a boring class pondering the fact that Sally Avril had quit the gymnastics team for undisclosed circumstances.

 

She had no idea who Sally Avril even was.

 

Sitting in her own seat, and smiled over at Peter, who gave her a short wave before resuming a whispered conversation with Lana that Cindy (despite her best unconscious efforts) could not hear, which was probably for the best.

 

“What’s up, Cin?” Aaron said as Cindy sat down, and Cindy turned his way to see him typing out a quick text before class began.

 

“Hi,” she said, digging out her textbook, where she had neatly tucked last night’s assignment into the front cover. Retrieving it and neatly unfolding it, she glanced over just in time to see Lana staring into Peter’s eyes for a long moment before gently kicking his leg.

 

“Ow, hey, c’mon,” Peter said with a laugh.

 

“You deserved it,” Lana grumbled back. “Stop giving me the dopey eyes.”

 

“I keep telling you, I have special eyes,” he said, and Cindy had to fight to not laugh at his comment. Lana just snorted, smacking him.

 

Mr. Kepler walked in at that point, shutting the door and moving to lean against his desk as the bell rang. The chatter continued for a moment before the teacher held his hand up.

 

“Alright, let’s bring it down,” he said. “C’mon, I only have your attention for forty-five minutes, then you can go back to your no-doubt fascinating teenage social experiences.”

 

The class quieted down, and he hopped up to sit on his desk.

 

“How many of you have heard about the Manhattan Mangle?” he asked, and a little buzz of conversation went up before dying, and several hands raised, Cindy’s included. She’d read about it all over the internet and even seen a grainy LiveLeaks video of it. “Hm…Miss Moon, enlighten us?”

 

“I guess some kind of mechanical…thing is wandering around Manhattan at night,” she said. “It’s not doing anything besides that, except one time it…well, it put a purse-snatcher in the hospital.”

 

“Exactly,” Mr. Kepler said, nodding approvingly. “And from what I’ve read, it only really knows how to screech and make some pretty disturbing noises.”

 

“Fredbear lives!” Aaron shouted from next to Cindy, and a few other students laughed, some of them cheering.

 

“Yes, yes, I’ve heard the comparisons to the video game,” Mr. Kepler said with a little smirk. “But the point is…you heard it on the news. Where did they hear it from?”

 

“Probably a reporter?” Mike Chase said from in front of Cindy, raising his hand.

 

“Mhm, but what about the reporter?” Mr. Kepler said. “Where did he or she hear about it?”

 

“Rumors?” Cindy asked, and Mr. Kepler nodded.

 

“Exactly,” he said. “And given that these rumors checked out, we can infer what?”

 

There was a moment of silence before Peter raised his hand, Mr. Kepler gesturing at him.

 

“Someone actually saw it,” he said, and Mr. Kepler gave him an approving nod.

 

“Someone saw it,” he repeated. “Someone got lucky or unlucky and saw this thing, probably through total happenstance. But what does that tell us?”

 

Pete raised his hand again, and Mr. Kepler grinned at him.

 

“Tell us, Pete,” he said.

 

“This kind of crazy stuff is going on whether we see it or not,” Pete answered, and Mr. Kepler gave a single clap of his hands.

 

“That’s it,” he said, hopping up. “Journalism isn’t just about pursuing stories that you know about or heard about. True investigative journalism is getting out there, chasing at shadows, following your gut and _looking_ for a story. There might be nothing there, or you might just find the next Manhattan Mangle or happen upon New York’s next superhero. They’re not all gonna be as nice as the Spider-Trio and throw some videos up on YouTube.”

 

There was a collective laugh, and out of the corner of her eye, Cindy saw Lana kick Peter’s leg again.

 

Hm.

 

“So, this is your next assignment,” Mr. Kepler said. “Find me a story. Chase a rumor, dig something up, get out there and look for something. It can be heartwarming, it can be terrifying, it can be hilarious. I don’t care. Just…for liability’s sake, don’t go running into anything dangerous. If you come to me with some kind of crime exposé, I will be forced to reprimand you.”

 

Another chuckle rippled through the classroom, and Mr. Kepler winked at them.

 

“Now, let’s get those take-home tests passed forward, and then I want you guys to find some leads, brainstorm, scribble some ideas down, the whole thing,” he said. “You can work in teams of two or fly solo, but no piggybacking. I want evidence of both partners working on this thing.”

 

“Cin, you wanna team up?” Aaron asked her, and Cindy shook her head.

 

“No, I…I think I’m gonna go solo on this one.”

 

……

 

“Well, this Journalism thing should be an easy A for you, hm?” Lana asks as we head for the exit at the end of the day. After Kepler’s class, Life Skills flew by, and Gym was a token effort as usual. Now, MJ, Gwen, Lana, and I are off to join up with Riley, Johnny, and Harry before we head to Harry’s place to get ready for a trip to the Black Cat Club.

 

“I dunno,” I say with a shrug. “I mean, it should be easy enough to happen across a story while I’m doing my spider-thing, but he said no crime exposés.”

 

“Crime is kind of our thing,” MJ says with a smirk, hugging onto my arm as Gwen laces her fingers with mine on my other hand.

 

Even if this isn’t any different from how the two usually walk with me, the tiny nuzzle MJ gives my shoulder definitely is, and it gets my heart hammering a bit.

 

Nope. Still not used to it.

 

“Still, all you have to do is your usual spider-stuff and like ask the people you’ve saved if they’ve heard any weird rumors or something,” Lana says, smirking. “Wouldn’t that fuck with them?”

 

“’Thank you so much, Spider-Man, how can I ever thank you?’” I say in a faux-shocked voice. “‘Well, hey, now that you mention it, heard any weird rumors floating around? I just love urban myths.’”

 

Gwen and MJ snicker on either side of me.

 

“Okay, if you do that, I want a recording of the guy’s face when a fucking _superhero_ asks him about local myths like some kind of RPG main character,” MJ says, and I smirk.

 

“Deal,” I say, glancing over to ask Lana if she wants to see the same, but she’s slowed to a stop, staring at something over my shoulder in utter shock. I turn to follow her gaze, frowning and disengaging myself from the girls, heading over to Lana but not looking away from the new arrival, a woman that looks like she could be her older sister.

 

“Mom,” Lana breathes, and I reach up to place a hand between her shoulders.

 

“Let’s get out of here, alright?” I say, and she trembles but nods.

 

“Lana,” her mother says. I think Lana told me at one time that her name is Lori. “It’s time to go.”

 

“I’m not fucking going anywhere with _you_ ,” Lana says. Lori studies her with a quirked eyebrow, looking to me.

 

“Boyfriend?” she asks. “Does he know you’re a criminal?”

 

“I know she was _forced_ down that path by a _very_ irresponsible young mother,” I say, and Lori snarls at me.

 

“I never forced her into anything,” she says. “She followed me out of her own free will.”

 

“Oh bullshit,” I say, wrapping an arm around Lana’s shoulders. To my surprise, she’s shaking like a leaf, sinking into my embrace. “You were the only example she had, and you were a criminal. She didn’t know anything else _besides_ the life you chose for her.”

 

“I am not going to argue parenting with a brat like you,” Lori says. “Lana, let’s _go_.”

 

Lana winces but looks up at her mother with a glare. “I’m not going with you, Mom,” she says in a level voice. “I’m not a criminal.”

 

“You are my daughter,” Lori says. “You will respect your mother.”

 

“Oh, and when have _you_ ever respected _me_ , Mom!?” Lana shouts. “For Christ’s sake, it’s a two-way street, and all you’ve ever done my whole life is _drag_ me along on your fucking crime sprees because you _need_ me to use our powers! Now I actually try to do something _worthwhile_ , and suddenly I’m supposed to respect you as a parent!?”

 

“Lana Alison Baumgartner, you are coming with me _right_ now,” she says, holding her hand out, and my spider-sense buzzes. With a jolt, I realize that their close proximity means their Bombshell powers are active again. Lana seems to realize the same thing, gasping and looking between her mother and me.

 

“You wouldn’t,” she growls, and Lori glares at me.

 

“I’d love to put this brat in his place,” she says. “Or several places.”

 

I’m about to simply throw secrecy to the winds and whisk Lana away, but I’m saved the trouble by the appearance of a translucent purple-blue barrier between Lori and the two of us. Lori blinks and looks wildly around, gasping when Johnny appears in full Dusk regalia, wings extended.

 

“Excuse me,” he says. “This is a place of learning, and I’m gonna have to ask you not to go blowing potholes in the sidewalk or the students.”

 

“Yeah, this school has already had to deal with giant lizards _and_ a throw-down between the Trio and the Iron Goblin,” Gwen’s voice says as she swings in, holding out her hands and _Thawp_ ing up Lori, wrapping her tightly in her webbing. “Mister Parker, if you’d please remove your friend from the area?”

 

“Yes, Ma’am, Miss Widow, Ma’am,” I say as Riley lands nearby, MJ in her Jackpot armor already ticking up to the confrontation.

 

Honestly, Lori should feel honored that half the Watch is showing up just for her.

 

I lead Lana away, and she’s still shaking, tears running down her cheeks. My spider-sense fades as we get further away from the effective range of their shared powers, finally disappearing completely as I lead her around the school and to a little bench under one of the few trees around the school. Aaron James runs by with a camera.

 

“Easiest A ever!” he yells as he passes us.

 

I sit on the bench and pull Lana down to sit next to me, pulling her into a one-armed embrace. She takes a deep breath, leaning against me and sighing.

 

“My mom is a bitch,” she grumbles, and I nod.

 

“Well, yeah, she is,” I say. Her arms come up and wrap around my waist, and she lets another little sigh, relaxing against me.

 

“That was…pretty cool of you, though,” she says. “Calling her out like that.”

 

“You did your fair share of calling-out, too,” I tell her, and she shrugs.

 

“Yeah, but I only had the guts to do it because of you,” she says, looking up at me with one of the most genuine smiles I’ve ever seen on her face. “You’re…I give you a lot of shit, but you’re pretty great.”

 

I reach up and rub small circles on her back, earning a soft, relaxed sigh as days of pent-up anxiety wash away. Apparently, Lori had been texting Lana for a little while, trying to get her to leave her new life behind and go back to being criminals with her. Lana was resistant, so Lori threatened to show up in person and convince her.

 

What she wasn’t counting on was Lana being friends with the Neighborhood Watch.

 

“We’ll probably have to give a police statement or something,” I say quietly, still rubbing her back. “They’ll get the story out of your mom, and they might send an officer to chat with us. Won’t be a big deal.”

 

“I just don’t even fucking care about that right now,” Lana says in a breathy voice, her eyes shut as she relaxes against me. “Can we just stay like this for a little bit?”

 

I nod. “Sure thing,” I tell her, now trailing my fingers along her back. Maybe this is a little past the threshold of “friend” behavior, but I can feel her relaxing against me, and frankly, Lana Baumgartner needs to chill out a bit.

 

“Um…thanks,” she says, her voice barely above a whisper. “For being an actual good friend.”

 

“Don’t mention it,” I tell her, and she lets a discontented little noise at that.

 

“Noooo, I’m gonna,” she says. “It’s not alright if I just…act like a total bitch to you while you’re nothing but super sweet to me.”

 

“Well, you haven’t had the best life up to this point,” I tell her. She sighs.

 

“I know,” she says. “Mom fucked me up real good. That day…. The day we met, I thought you were just another cocky hero looking to beat up some bad guys. Then I got stuck under that car, and Mom bailed on me, and…” she hunches her shoulders, and I squeeze her tighter. “I guess I realized that…no one in my life _actually_ cared about me.”

 

I only give her another squeeze to remind her that I certainly do, as well as a lot of people in her life now.

 

“I saw you, and…well, you were supposed to be a hero, so I thought maybe you’d save me,” she says. “And you did. You could’ve just fucked off to save the day, left another criminal behind, but you saved me. You hauled me out of there, fixed me up, you…even gave me a dorky-ass pep talk.”

 

I chuckle and she just shakes her head.

 

“You could have been the cockiest little shit or yelled at me, but you…you were a hero,” she says, letting a little laugh. “My actual hero. And, well…you saw what I did when I found out who you were.”

 

Oh, yeah, I remember that.

 

She smirks up at me, squeezing me again. “So…I don’t know, I guess I just wanted to tell you, that…that all means a lot to me,” she says. “ _You_ mean a lot to me. And I give you shit because I’m just not good with emotions like that, but…you don’t deserve me being a total bitch if you don’t know that I actually do care about you. Like…a lot. And I know you have that thing with Gwen, and I’m not gonna try to be a homewrecker, but…you set way too high a bar, so you just have to deal with me having a major thing for you, alright?”

 

“Um…yeah, I think I can deal with that,” I say, and she nods, sliding away from me and standing, stretching and cracking her back a bit.

 

“Ah, okay,” she says. She turns to me and gives me a one-sided little smile. “Enough of this mushy feelings shit, I’m hungry.”

 

My pocket buzzes, and I get my phone out to see a text from MJ.

 

**_From: Miss Watson_ **

_[hey! We took Miss Meanie down to the station, and surprise, a million warrants out on her!]_

_[We’re on our way to Harry’s place. Do you want Taco Bell or Arby’s?]_

 

“Taco Bell or Arby’s?” I ask Lana, who just strolls over and leans against me, peeking at my screen.

 

“Arby’s, of course,” she says with a smirk. “If they only knew they were Spider-Man’s favorite restaurant.”

 

“I would so do some kind of advertisement thing for them,” I say with a smirk. “’After a long day of fighting crime, nothing satisfies my hunger quite like twelve beef and cheddar sandwiches with four large curly fries.’”

 

“And yet you’re just solid fucking muscle,” she says, her hands brushing over my abs as I text MJ back. “No fair.”

 

**_To: Miss Watson_ **

_[Arby’s! We’ll be along in a few.]_

 

“C’mon, I bet we can still catch a bus,” I say. “Unless you wanna piggy-back while I web us there?”

 

“Um, as much fun as that in no way sounds like, I think I’ll just settle for the bus,” she says, following as we retrace our steps back to the front of the school. “Kitty Pryde may get off clinging to you like Bella Swan, but I’m not about that life.”

 

“There is just too much going on in my life that I compare to _Twilight_ , and I hate it,” I say as we head for the bus stop. Lana just snorts.

 

“Superpowered high-school boy with a secret double life and irresistible charm?” she says. “You’re a better Edward Cullen than Edward Cullen. Robert Pattinson and his weird-ass nose have nothing on you.”

 

“His nose?”

 

“You never noticed?” she asks. “Fucker’s got a lopsided nose. It’s like someone had two half-noses left and just stuck ‘em together like, ‘Close enough!’ and hoped no one would notice.”

 

“I never made it a point to pay attention to his nose,” I say, and Lana rolls her eyes.

 

“Mom fucking loved those movies,” she says. “When I was ten, she dragged me to the midnight premiere of one of them so it didn’t look like she was there to watch it herself.”

 

“I don’t think a ten-year-old being a fan of Twilight is much better than someone her age,” I say, and she snorts. “The setting was pretty, though.”

 

“Yeah,” she admits. “And, well…okay, I liked some of the music. During my gothy emo middle-school phase.”

 

“That you haven’t completely left behind?” I ask with a pointed glance at her painted-black nails, dark purple lipstick, and fishnet armwear. She gives me a withering look, smacking me in the arm.

 

“Fuck you.”

 

……

 

“This seems like the wrong way to go about this,” Gwen says as we change into our civilian clothes in the depths of decidedly dingy alleyway deep in Hell’s Kitchen.

 

“Showing up to a bar run by a known criminal in our spider-gear would cause all kinds of a ruckus,” Riley says, glancing over at me as she pulls her shirt over her head, her hair floofing out the top.

 

“We don’t need a ruckus,” I say. “We need to be low-key.”

 

“Because three obviously underage kids showing up at this place on a school night is totally low-key,” Gwen says, stepping over to help Riley fix her hair.

 

“It _is_ low-key because that’s what we look like to these people,” Riley says. “We’re just three kids in over our heads to them. Nothing to pay attention to.”

 

“And if things do go crazy, we can bolt,” I say.

 

That’s why it’s just the three of us. MJ and Harry wanted to come along (Harry most of all), but it was very quickly agreed-upon that the we should be the only ones, given that we don’t have to put on armor if a fight should break out.

 

And Harry’s armor still isn’t finished anyway.

 

I should get on that when we’re done here.

 

Who knew being a superhero would keep me so busy?

 

“You ready?” Gwen asks, her hand sliding into mine as we head toward the street.

 

“Not especially,” I admit. “Let’s go.”

 

I step out, doing a quick scan of the street, but it’s fairly quiet. In this part of the city, at this time of night, you don’t just go out for an evening stroll. I do see three or four guys grouped in the mouth of an alley across the street, but for all I know, that could just be a regular haunt for them.

 

I doubt it.

 

Riley steps out after me, and I see her eyes dart around as she also gives our surroundings a once-over, glancing at me before we make our way down the sidewalk, Gwen stepping between us.

 

Some quick Googling told us that the Black Cat Club is apparently located in Hell’s Kitchen, the unofficial organized crime center of the city. Of course, whatever her “Robin Hood” intentions, she’s still a criminal, and that means she has to maintain connections with the more unsavory types.

 

This should hopefully work in our advantage tonight.

 

We approach the club, and even from the outside, I can hear the steady bass of some dance tune that MJ would probably love getting down to. There’s not much of a line, the lone bouncer out front just nodding at people as they walk in. A place like this probably gets a lot of regulars but that’s it.

 

You don’t see many tourists in this part of town.

 

The bouncer eyes us as we approach, and immediately, his expression shifts to suspicion. He’s got a mop of straw-blond hair and a stubbly face that might be handsome if it wasn’t marred deeply by a Glasgow smile.

 

“Alright, you three, sod off,” he says in an Irish accent. “No kids.”

 

“We’re here to see Felicia,” I say, and he snorts.

 

“Got a lotta nerve, haven’t ya?” he asks. “I don’t know where ya heard that name, but ya best forget it quick. We don’t take kindly ta threats ‘round here.”

 

“We’re not threatening anyone,” I say, realizing that it’s probably not common knowledge that Felicia Hardy is the Black Cat. She must trust me a lot, then.

 

Wow.

 

“We just want to speak with her,” Riley says. “We’re…friends of hers.”

 

“You don’t do this a lot, do you?” the bouncer asks, and we all shake our heads. He sighs and tugs at the collar of his leather jacket, speaking into a little microphone pinned there. “Ma’am. There are three kids out here, say they know you.”

 

I hear the tinny sound of her voice coming back in his earpiece, but I can’t make out the words. The bouncer looks up and stares into my eyes, snorting.

 

“Right in one, Ma’am,” he says. “You know him?”

 

More tinny words, this time in a much more excited tone. The bouncer sighs, but his scarred lips quirk in the smallest of actual smiles as he listens to Felicia gush over the earpiece. He steps back and gestures at the door.

 

“Straight to the back, down the hall past the dance floor,” he says. “No side trips to the bar.”

 

“Thanks,” Gwen says as we head in. The muffled music grows louder as we reach the door, and I step forward to push it open, letting a wall of sound hit us.

 

Inside, the club certainly lives up to its name. The walls are pitch black with rows of lighting from floor to ceiling spaced a few yards apart. To the right is the bar, a colorful affair with backlit shelves, bright bottles of alcohol on display, and a glowing countertop. There are a good two dozen or so stools arrayed before the counter, with some more tables nearby. To the left is the dance floor itself, though there are only a few people actually dancing, being that it’s Monday night. Beyond the dance floor, more booths sit in a raised seating area partitioned off with metal bars. Further past that, I can just make out a small archway with a sign above it reading _“Private Rooms”_.

 

I’m sure many a clandestine criminal meeting has been held there.

 

“Hey,” Riley’s voice says in my ear, and she points straight ahead. Past the bar and dance floor, another archway leads to the bathrooms and, presumably, Felicia’s office is further on.

 

“Let’s do this,” I say, leading the way. We earn a few curious glances, but we made sure to dress in rattier, old clothes, hopefully to look the part of hired street urchins or something. It must work, because no one pays us too much mind as we pass through to the hallway. It’s quieter back here, though not by much.

 

“It smells like cigarettes,” Gwen says distastefully, and I shrug.

 

“I don’t imagine they care much about a no-smoking policy,” Riley says before I can, and I just nod at her.

 

We reach a thick, solid-looking door with an electronic combination lock on the handle and the word _“Manager”_ on it gold lettering. I glance at Gwen and Riley, and Riley finally reaches past me and knocks. The door opens in seconds, and Felicia Hardy is standing there with a bright smile on her face, looking as flawlessly pretty as ever, like a tastefully sexy secretary.

 

“My, my, three for the price of one,” she says, her eyes moving over Gwen, pausing to wink at me and then drifting to Riley. She blinks, gasping and leaning down to examine her from an uncomfortably close distance. “Look at _you_! Oh my goodness, it’s like someone took all of the cute off of him and made my wildest Sapphic fantasies come true!”

 

She gives Riley a gentle tug, pulling her into the office, and we follow, the door shutting heavily behind us, and the music from the bar abruptly cuts off.

 

At least the room is soundproofed.

 

I turn to see Riley staring up at Felicia, her face the picture of utter bewilderment as Felicia cups her cheeks and examines her.

 

“Could you be…oh, it _is_ you!” she squeaks out. “Oh, sweetie, he did go through with it, then, didn’t he?”

 

“Huh?” Riley asks, gasping as I realize the same thing she does.

 

“Wait, you were part of the Superior Six for a while, weren’t you?” I ask. “I remember.”

 

She nods, smiling plaintively and stepping back.

 

“I’ve cleaned up my act, though, promise,” she says. “Or…dusted it off a little, at least.” She winks again, making her way over to a low couch near door and settling down onto it. There’s a coffee table in front of it with a few chairs around it. Besides that and a desk, the office is somewhat bare but for a few plants and some admittedly gaudy statuettes and one painting on the wall of the Parisian skyline.

 

“Please, sit,” Felicia says, gesturing at the chairs. She eyes Riley and pats the spot next to her. “And you _must_ tell me _your_ name, Spiderette.”

 

“Riley,” she introduces herself, striding over and sitting next to her. “You…seem to know a bit about me.”

 

Felicia sighs, leaning back and reaching for the end table next to the couch, where a tumbler of amber liquid sits. She takes a sip and studies Riley.

 

“Otto didn’t tell me much,” she says. “He was never really a guy to share his plans. He just expected you to do your part. Way too business for me. But after we…parted ways, I decided to make a trip back to see if I could collect a…severance package.”

 

“You went back to that hellhole to see what you could steal?” Riley asks, and Felicia bites her lip, holding her hands up in a shrug.

 

“I’m good at one thing, Kitten,” she says to her, and Riley rolls her eyes. “Anyway, there wasn’t much I could make heads or tails of. If I was a tech-brain like one of you, I maybe could’ve snatched up some neat computer stuff. But I _did_ see his…collection.”

 

“Those vats,” Riley says.

 

Felica nods. “Seven of them,” she says. “You were Subject Six. I wish I knew more than that, but I only got a look at them. I couldn’t figure out any of that mumbo-jumbo on the screens.”

 

“What did they look like?” Riley and I ask at the same time, and Felica smirks.

 

“Do you two have the same brain, or – “

 

“Yes.”

 

“What did they _look_ like?”

 

“Alright, calm down,” she says, sounding amused and holding her hands up defensively. “There were three that looked mostly like you, but one was scrawnier, and one looked…I dunno, off. Haggard. There was another that looked like they aged him up too fast. There was a…well, a little-person one. There was one that looked all hairy and spidery, and then there was this cutie.” She pats Riley on the head, giggling at her.

 

Riley just quirks an eyebrow at her.

 

“Look, that’s all I know,” she insists. “I don’t know what he was planning to _do_ with the clones. He up and disappeared, and no one’s seen hide nor hair of him in weeks. His pals show up once in a while to steal some equipment from Roxxon or Hammer Tech, but that’s it.”

 

“This makes no sense,” Gwen says. “Why would he go to all the trouble of making _seven_ clones of you and toss half of them out?”

 

“Maybe some of them were…not what he wanted,” I say.

 

“That’s a better term than ‘screw-ups’,” Riley mutters.

 

“Aw, honey, you’re not a screw-up,” Felicia says, tousling her hair. “Look at you, you’re adorable.”

 

“I think we’re getting a bit sidetracked,” Gwen says, leaning against me. “Um…Felicia? We actually wanted to ask you what you know about…well….”

 

“We’re starting a full-on actual vigilante crime-fighting group,” Riley says. “And we were wondering if you could help us figure out where to start.”

 

“Oh, you’re gonna shine up the Big Apple?” Felicia says with a pout. “But what about me? I’m just a ne’er-do-well like the rest. Gonna cuff me up and haul me away?”

 

“You might like that,” Riley says, and Felicia winks at her.

 

“Guilty,” she says with a little sigh, reaching up to pinch Riley’s cheek. “Ack, so cute. Alright, I’ll tell you what I know, but mum’s the word on who your sexy feline informant is, hm?”

 

Gwen pulls out a notebook and pen, poised and ready to write. “Do tell.”

 

“With a little notebook and everything!” Felicia says, smirking at her. “You three are just precious. I actually really hope this works out for you and I was there for the start of it.”

 

“Felicia,” Riley says, and the older girl practically purrs.

 

“Alright,” she says. “Well, obviously, the big player in town is Wilson Fisk, the Kingpin. Guy’s untouchable. Has a team of lawyers ready to get him down to a fine for murdering someone in broad daylight. I can point you to some of his operations I know about, if you want. Other than that, it’s the Maggia families. You guys have already been giving them hell, but there’s a new guy in charge of the Hammerhead family, and Silvio Manfredi’s son Joseph has taken charge of the Silvermane family. And, word is there’s another family joining up called the Nefaria Family. They’re apparently into some weird occult stuff.”

 

“Anyone else?” Gwen asks, scribbling frantically.

 

“Just one guy I’ve heard about,” Felica says, idly braiding Riley’s hair. Riley feebly bats her hands away once, but Felicia is gently persistent, and soon, she’s receiving a French braid as Felicia goes on. “No one knows what he looks like, but his goons have shown up a couple times, and he’s rumored to be behind that big Godzilla thing you guys fought the other day.”

 

“Who is he?” I ask, and Felicia just shrugs.

 

“All I know is, he calls himself Kaine,” she says. “That’s what his boys say, at least. He’s made some enemies already, though.”

 

“Who?” Riley asks.

 

“A new guy on the scene,” Felicia says. “He seemed pretty upset at Kaine for some reason. All he would say was Kaine was ‘playing with toys that didn’t belong to him’. Chatty guy. Cute voice, but he wouldn’t take off his mask.”

 

“He wore a mask?” Gwen asks, and Felica nods.

 

“Mostly black getup, but he had a white logo, kinda like your spiders,” she says, pointing at my chest. “And big white circles around his eyes.” She drew little circles around her own. “His costume actually looked like he was going for your look but didn’t quite make it.”

 

“Did he give you a name?” I ask. If this guy is after someone we might be going after, well…we could look him up, at least.

 

“I think he called himself Ed Pool,” Felicia says, finishing up with Riley’s hair and leaving her with an actually rather cute braid. “Yeah, but he said it fast, like it was all one word, like Edpool.”

 

“Well, it’s worth looking into, if we can,” Gwen says. “Is that all you know?”

 

“Mhm, but I can keep my eye out,” she says, smiling coquettishly at Riley. “If Kitten here comes back to see me.”

 

She _really_ likes Riley.

 

“You already did my hair,” Riley says with a smirk, though she does look happy at the attention. “Are you gonna try to play dress-up next time?”

 

“Don’t tempt me,” Felicia says. “You could rock the gothic-lolita look. Or maybe an old-fashioned dress and some heels, lying across a piano and serenading the bar?”

 

“She does have a good singing voice,” Gwen points out, and Riley shoots her a dirty look.

 

“Oh, that’s perfect!” Felicia says with a smile, glancing over at me. “Oh, and handsome fellow here can slip into a suit and tickle the ivories?”

 

“I could give it a shot,” I say with a shrug, and Felica smiles, standing.

 

“Alright, that’s a date for next time you grace me with your presence,” she says, taking Riley’s hand and pulling her along with her as she strides over to her desk. “For now, let me show you some of the places I know you’ll wanna scope out on your cute little patrols.”

 

……

 

It’s another half hour (in which Felicia insists on doing Riley’s makeup and dressing her in a lovely evening gown) before we leave, promising Felicia that our next visit will be a social call and not business.

 

“And I want you to think of a good song to serenade me with next time you come through, Kitten,” Felicia says as we leave, and Riley just glowers at her, but she can’t fight a smile as Felicia blows her a kiss.

 

“Boy, she _really_ likes you,” Gwen says as we leave, Riley showing a remarkable ability to walk in the heels Felicia insisted she wear.

 

That spider-balance has some real-world applications as well, it seems.

 

“Well, she did always treat…us like some kind of…”

 

“Cute little puppy,” I say, snickering. “I think she thought I was cute in a ‘ He’ll be hunky someday’ kind of way.”

 

“But I’m…well, girly cute to her right now,” Riley says. “And I think she might be into the whole ‘boy’s brain, girl’s body’ thing.”

 

“Maybe that’s her fetish,” Gwen says, and Riley and I make twin faces of distaste.

 

“You know she has a sex dungeon,” Riley says matter-of-factly.

 

“Oh, without a doubt,” I say as we head down an alley.

 

“Alright, you two, enough pervy speculation about our criminal contact,” Gwen says. “Let’s get home, it’s a school night.”

 

She hops onto a wall and starts climbing up. Riley and I turn to each other as she ascends.

 

“I do wanna learn how to play the piano now, though,” I say, and Riley giggles.

 

“If the spider thing doesn’t work out, at least we have a backup.”

 


	7. Chapter 7

Sometimes I forget how many stories New York holds. How many “settings” there are, and how many stories overlap and intertwine, even if the main characters don’t even know it. A whole life can begin, be lived, and end within one borough, with that person having never even left the little circle that he knowns as his entire world. But that life, and those experiences are no more or less valuable than, say, mine or Gwen’s or even Harry’s, who’s carved a path from coast to coast. Measuring one person’s value against another’s is impossible, and to even attempt to do so is to devalue what it means to be human. All we can do is make sure that each person is allowed their basic human right to do what _they_ want with their life.

 

“Thinking deep thoughts?” Kitty asks from behind me, and I grin at her in the glass, the tinted glass providing a ghostly reflection of her smile.

 

“Eh, just psyching myself up,” I say. “Sometimes you have to remind yourself what you’re fighting for, I guess. Or I do, at least.”

 

She steps up next to me, both of us staring out over New York in the afternoon sun. Two weeks ago, we started the Neighborhood Watch, and after some preparation (and a first attempt at a patrol last weekend), we’re ready to take this seriously. The procedure’s been ironed out, methodologies have been fine-tuned, and the Neighborhood Watch is still kind of a silly name, but Riley and I are over it.

 

“So, what are you fighting for?” Kitty asks, smiling up at me, and I shrug.

 

“You’ll call me some kinda goody two-shoes dork or something,” I tell her. Giggling, she bumps me with her shoulder.

 

“Probably,” she says, “but I also like when you get all heroic and stuff. It reminds me that there’s at least one person in this world that’s good for the sake of good.”

 

“Fair enough,” I say, leaning against the window. “I guess…I wanna end the day knowing that there are as many life-stories out there to be told as possible.”

 

“That’s sort of poetic,” Kitty says, fixing her big doe-eyes on me. “I like it.”

 

“If I see you quoting that in a Newsweek article or something, I’ll come after you,” I say.

 

“Oh noooo,” she says with a little laugh, giving me a coy look. “Is that a promise?”

 

“No comment,” I immediately say, and she lets a single laugh, bumping me again.

 

“I actually have a message to deliver, though,” she says. “MJ needs help with her armor. I guess it won’t deploy properly or something?”

 

I chuckle; more likely, she’s looking for another opportunity to snag a make-out before we head out. I thank Kitty and head for the stairs of the Osborn penthouse, which has been appropriated as our headquarters, given that Norman Osborn (along with Tony and several others) is overseas on some kind of mission or something. Even when he’s stateside, though, Norman is rarely home, especially lately. I reach the landing and head down the hall to the room that’s been appropriate as MJ’s “staging room” where she completes her transformation into Jackpot.

 

“Alright, MJ, what’s the…oh, jeez,” I say, sighing when I see MJ pouting at the brick of armor that is feebly beeping and wiggling out a few feelers. She’s wearing only her form-fitting undersuit, and I’m not gonna lie, it looks damn good clinging to her like a second skin. At my entrance, she looks up and pouts, an adorably vexed look on her face.

 

“Peter, I know you invented it, but this armor is being ridiculous!” she huffs. “Watch. Jackpot armor deploy!”

 

The armor chirps briefly but continues to stay resolutely flat on the chair nearby. I shake my head and move over to her, where she hugs me, squeezing a bit tighter than usual out of frustration.

 

“Mary Jane Watson, have you been recalibrating the voice command like I believe I expressly told you to – “

 

“Aaaaagh!” MJ groans, but I continue.

 

“Like I definitely expressly told you to do at least once a week the day _after_ I gave you the armor?”

 

“No,” she pouts, hunching her shoulders. I chuckle and lean in, capturing a little kiss, and she smiles impishly up at me.

 

“What are you?” I ask her.

 

“I’m a Forgetful Francine?” she asks with a sheepish little bite of her lip.

 

“Yes you are,” I tell her with a playful bop on the head, and she giggles, pressing against me and kissing me again.

 

“Don’t act like you aren’t loving staring at my ass in these tights,” she whispers into my ear, and I chuckle.

 

I just roll my eyes with a smile, and she giggles, slapping me gently on the chest before I pull away and head over to the armor. “Baymax, alpha user override on the Jackpot unit.”

 

“ _Override initiated…complete_ ,” Baymax says. “ _Ready for input_.”

 

I glance pointedly at MJ, who, smirks at me. “Jackpot armor, deploy.”

 

There’s a small chirping from the armor brick before it hums softly. “ _Deployment command confirmed_.”

 

“Do you remember how to recalibrate the armor?” I ask, turning to MJ, who makes quite a show of rolling her eyes at me.

 

“Oh my gosh, yes,” she says, trotting over to me with exaggeratedly tired steps and hugging onto me again. She slumps into me with a pointed sigh. “I’m sorry I’m so horrible, Pete.”

 

“You are so the opposite of horrible,” I tell her, and she giggles, looking up at me and planting another more heated kiss on my lips.

 

“And you’re the best boyfriend ever,” she whispers. “Love you.”

 

“Love you, too,” I say, kissing her again. “Alright, get your armor on and let’s get out there.”

 

“Okay,” she says with a smile. “Oh! You should take Jess along in your patrol group. She’s really missed you, and Gwen and I get you to ourselves during the week.”

 

“That’s…actually really nice of you to suggest,” I say, smiling at her, and she takes my hand in both of hers.

 

“It’s getting…like, less weird, right?” she asks. “This whole setup?”

 

“The weirdness is definitely fading,” I say. “You three are…very enthusiastic about it.”

 

She giggles. “It helps that Gwen and I are best buds, and she and Jess are close,” she says. “And Jess and I are…I mean, we’re alright and getting better. Gwen keeps telling us that we should try to be better friends if this is really gonna work.”

 

“She’s a smart one,” I say, and MJ smiles.

 

“She is,” she says, giving me a little shove. “Alright, get out of here before I have to use the armor as a chastity belt.”

 

“I’m gonna try real hard not to think about the implications of that statement,” I say as I head for the door.

 

“Probably for the best,” MJ says in a singsong voice as I head out and down the hall.

 

The worst part is, I can’t even really express the little gripes I have about having three girlfriends (like the fact that three girlfriends means three various degrees of borderline-sexual teasing) to anyone, since this whole arrangement is sort of on the down-low for now. Even if I was able to, though, if I tried at any time to express any amount of discomfort at this whole thing, I would quickly find myself being chewed out by just about any of the guys in my friend group because I’m complaining about having three girlfriends.

 

There are parts of this that are downright uncomfortable sometimes.

 

Still, I wouldn’t give any of this up, simply because I’ve never seen any of them happier. They all actually get along swimmingly, and so far, not a single one has expressed any amount of jealousy. It’s all going so perfectly that I’ve found myself waiting for some other facet of my life to crumble out from under me, since that’s how it usually works. The fact that nothing has gone wrong yet only serves to keep me further on edge.

 

I’m not sure if I’m just being extra diligent or downright paranoid. Can it be some degree of both?

 

I head back downstairs and find Jess and Gwen chit-chatting next to the giant screen displaying an interactive map of New York. Riley is poking away at it, sending me an idle wave as I join them. She’s taken to rooting out the spots that need attention while I assign our personnel to said spots. It’s my way of sharing the workload, and frankly, it’s easier than me taking on both tasks.

 

Jess spots me as I come downstairs, smiling at me in that secretive sort of way she and MJ have taken to. Gwen notices where she’s looking and places a hand on her forearm, whispering something in her ear before turning to Riley and pointing at the screen in a distraction ploy that should be painfully obvious to my clone. Thankfully, she also seems to understand that there’s something that needs to be kept secret amongst us and that I would surely tell her if she needed to know.

 

She’s also probably extremely curious, as I would be in such a situation, but she understands the need for secrecy.

 

It’s still unnerving, the level at which we just understand each other.

 

Jess strolls up to me, and we duck into the darkened kitchen. She runs her hands up along my stomach to my chest, cupping my jaw with her warm fingers.

 

“Peter,” she sings softly into the darkness.

 

“Jessica,” I say back, amusement in my voice. “Wanna patrol with me tonight?”

 

“Of course,” she says with a giggle, leaning in to snag a kiss. “Best boyfriend ever,” she whispers.

 

“I’ve been hearing that a lot tonight,” I muse, and she winks.

 

“Don’t let it go to your head,” she says. “You won’t be able to fit your mask on, and you need that sexy voice modulator.”

 

“It doesn’t sound weird?” I ask. I tried to make sure it would scramble my voice a bit without making it sound too Darth Vader. I think I settled on a good Optimus Prime that makes me sound older.

 

“No, it’s sexy,” she says, giggling. “Lucky me, my voice gets all fiery when I flame on.”

 

“Now when I tell people my girlfriend is hot, it has a whole new meaning,” I tell her, and she rolls her eyes.

 

“I was waiting for that one,” she mutters. “You get a pass because you said I’m hot, and that’s super sweet.”

 

I chuckle, leaning in for another kiss. She lets a happy little noise as she pulls away, taking my hand in both of hers.

 

“Love you,” she says softly, and I lean in to press our foreheads together.

 

“Love you, too,” I tell her, and she giggles happily, giving me a little push away.

 

“Alright, let’s get moving,” she says. “New York awaits.”

 

We head back out to find the team assembled in the living-room-turned-command-center, and Riley glances over from the display with a curious look, but she just points at the screen, where three areas have been highlighted with spinning reticules, a dozen others just sporting smaller dots.

 

“Three big ones,” she says. “Meth lab owned by the Kingpin’s people, that one should be simple enough to head in and take care of.”

 

“Gwen, you and MJ wanna take that one?” I say, and Gwen nods, smirking over and holding out a fist, which MJ bumps.

 

“Okay,” Riley says, and the reticule around that area blinks to yellow. “Pawn shop in Harlem, likely money-laundering spot? I’d recommend a tail. See where they run off to, follow the chain to the top?”

 

“Johnny, why don’t you and Harry take that?” I say. “Should be easy for you two to keep a low profile.”

 

“Hell yeah,” Johnny says, grinning at Harry, who smirks back. “Dusk and Silver Surfer, superspies.”

 

Another ring blinks yellow, and Riley points out another.

 

“This one’s a biggie,” she says. “This is that counterfeit operation from last week. We tracked them to an old wharf on Staten Island. Abandoned, out of the way, probably packed with baddies. You might wanna make this one a trio.”

 

“Jess, wanna handle that one with me?” I ask Jess, who just nods eagerly.

 

“Yeah, I wanna get out there and do some fighting!” she says. “Oh, we should take Kitty along. She’s good to have if the bullets start flying.”

 

“Fair point,” I say, turning to Kitty, who’s already grinning, trying to hide the fact that she’s bouncing eagerly on her heels. “I suppose there’s no point in asking if you’re okay with that?”

 

“Uh, only a whole bunch,” she says with a happy twirl. “Yay, patrol with Spider-Man!”

 

“I figure the rest of us can just be on-call and patrol,” Riley says, glancing at Bobby and Flash in turn. “You two can partner up, and I’ll fly solo?”

 

“Riley, maybe you shouldn’t go off – “

 

“Nah, that sounds good,” I say with a glance at Gwen as I cut her off. She gives me a look but sighs, nodding.

 

“Just be careful,” she tells Riley. “Call for help if you get in a pinch.”

 

“Promise,” Riley says, pulling her mask on and working her ponytail through the back, her voice modulated as she speaks again. “ _We ready to move out?_ ”

 

“Kitty, are you just piggybacking again?” Jess asks, and Kitty shrugs.

 

“Yeah, and I guess I just won’t chatter on too much,” she says. “I don’t think we need to worry too much about people recognizing my voice, though.”

 

I shake my head, giving her a determined smile, and she giggles right back.

 

“I will find a way around that phasing thing someday,” I tell her. She just sticks her tongue out.

 

“Good luck,” she says in a singsong voice. “Until then, no fancy gadgets for me to wreck with my powers.”

 

“Well, I’m sure you don’t mind the piggyback rides one bit,” Jess quips, and Kitty smiles impishly.

 

“My own personal roller-coaster with a nonstop commentary during fights?” she says, clambering onto my back and hugging onto me. “You won’t see me complaining ever.”

 

Gwen and Jess share a significant look, and Gwen whispers something in MJ’s ear that makes her quirk an eyebrow, giggling softly and whispering something back.

 

I don’t need spider-sense to tell me shenanigans are afoot. And three girlfriends means three times the mischief, which is…just tons of fun.

 

I’m being as sarcastic as I possibly can, of course.

 

I pull my own mask over my face, the HUD blinking to life.

 

“ _Baymax_ ,” I say, my own voice modulator cutting out the high-end and giving my voice a deeper, post-puberty sound. “ _Sync up with the map, chart a route to Waypoint C, and track the whole Watch’s movements. Patch the Crime Alert Array into Scarlet Spider, Electro, and Iceman and alert me if anything catastrophic is happening_.”

 

“ _Of course, Peter_ ,” Baymax says. “ _Map is now—syncing. Map synchronized. Charting route to—Waypoint C._ ”

 

Okay, so he talks like a Speak & Spell, but at least he can speak.

 

“ _Let’s hit it_ ,” I say, heading for the window and leaping out, Kitty clutching tightly to me with a jubilant scream.

 

……

 

“So, how are we gonna do this?” Kitty asks, stretching as we linger on the roof of the wharf. Apparently, she lightens her own density when she’s hanging onto me so her muscles don’t strain from hanging on, but that doesn’t stop things from getting stiff, I guess.

 

“ _Baymax, thermal scan, tag body heat signatures_ ,” I say, and my vision shifts to the dark blue of my heat vision. “ _Fifteen people…wait, seventeen. Two in an office or something. Baymax, who owns this place?_ ”

 

“ _The—building—is property of—Fisk Industries,_ ” Baymax says in his halting speech pattern.

 

“What’s the plan?” Jess asks, and I look up at her, rewarded with a ball of white-hot light that fills my thermal vision.

 

“ _Baymax, kill thermal scanner_ ,” I say, blinking away stars. “ _The plan is actually pretty straightforward here. We go in, kick some ass, trash their equipment, get on out._ ”

 

“I like it,” she says, and I head across the roof to where a raised portion in the middle sticks up, ringed with windows to let in air or light or something. I peek in and see a fairly impressive operation, presses printing off thousands of dollars of fake bills in a matter of seconds, supervised by men and women in jumpsuits and PPE. Meanwhile, around the edges of the place, guards stand with automatic rifles and semiautomatic guns.

 

“If the Kingpin is so rich, why is he counterfeiting money?” Kitty asks softly, peeking in alongside me. I turn to her, and she smiles back. Rather than a full facemask, she opted for a domino mask that covers her eyes and a bright yellow and black costume reminiscent of her X-Men uniform but different enough to dissociate herself from them

 

“ _Burn money_ ,” I tell her. “ _Pay off a bunch of low-rent thugs with counterfeits, they’ll never know the difference. Spend the real stuff on high-end dealings. That’s my best guess, at least. Now, when we get in there, bullets are probably gonna start flying. Use the equipment as cover; they won’t wanna do much damage to it. Shadowcat, you can move around more easily, so find the stamps they’re using. Destroy those, it’ll be even harder for them to get things started back up_.”

 

“Got it,” Kitty says, bouncing nervously in place.

 

“ _We ready_?” I ask, and they nod. “ _Alright, three…two…one._ ”

 

I bust into the window, webbing onto the ceiling and immediately swinging in to take out one guy, kicking him into a wall and knocking him out cold before he even knows what’s happening.

 

“What the fuck!?” another yells. “Boss!”

 

“ _Surprise!_ ” I yell, skidding to a halt and zipping to the right to deal with another thug that’s raising his rifle at me. I kick it out of his hands, socking him in the face, and catch the gun, turning and cracking another guy in the jaw with the butt or the stock or whatever it is. Nearby, I can see Jess zipping around, opting not to toss around fireballs (which would be rather dangerous, all things considered) and instead using her fire-induced speed to deliver some very firm punches and kicks to the thugs. They might have some burns, but they’ll mend.

 

“Spider-Man!” a voice yells, and I see a thug skidding to a stop, having run up to me before realizing who he’s dealing with. He drops his gun, raising his hands and turning around to run away. “Fuck this, I’m out!”

 

Smart guy.

 

Another one isn’t so smart, raising a gun, and my spider-sense clangs, carrying me left, right, ducking under another bullet as I leap closer.

 

_Zzt-SHAFF!_

 

“Gaaaah!” the guy yells, crumpling as I tase him to the ground, leaping backward as another runs at me, whipping a knife at the spot I was just occupying. I fly over him in a backflip that probably looks really awesome, landing and sweeping his legs, bringing the other foot up in a kick that connects with his head on the way down.

 

“Nyaaaagh!” another voice yells, and I see a thug flying through the air as Kitty socks him before disappearing into the machine, which jutters to a halt, creaking and groaning as thousands of moving parts sputter and stop. An eerie quiet settles, and Kitty runs up with a stack of heavy metal stamps, presenting them proudly to me.

 

“Is that it?” Jess asks, floating over. “I thought that would be harder.”

 

“ _Well, it was seventeen muggles with guns_ ,” I say, shrugging as I take the stamps and pass them over to her. “ _Melt these for me, darling?_ ”

 

“Of course,” she says, taking them and gripping them tightly. I look away as a blinding white light flares up between her hands, molten metal dripping to the floor with a hot hissing sound. In seconds, the fire has died down, and she smiles at me. “There! No more fake moneys.”

 

“ _I still feel like that fight was just a little_ – “

 

“A little too easy?” a voice says, and we all wheel to face the large bay door that clatters open seconds later, revealing a tall, well-muscled man in a tight green shirt and jeans. His skin is…either very weathered or just old. Or that’s my first thought. He steps into a shaft of afternoon sunlight, and Kitty gasps from next to me.

 

His skin is heavily textured, like packed sand. He looks like someone made a very intricate sand sculpture and brought it to life or something. Even his hair is the same color, looking like it was carved from his scalp.

 

“You just cost the Kingpin months of work,” he says, his hands growing, the ground under his feet shifting as he clenches his stony fists, which are now the size of boulders. “You have no idea who you’re messing with.”

 

“ _The bald guy from_ The Mummy?” I ask. “ _What was his name_?”

 

“Imhotep,” Kitty says. “Mom loves that movie.”

 

“I’m the Sandman,” he says. “And you three just fucked up for the last time.”

 

He lunges, and my spider-sense sends me leaping under a rocky fist, which phases right through Kitty, causing the Sandman (original name, bro) to spin wildly with his momentum, but he recovers and swipes at Jess, who flies backward in a burst flame before he can connect.

 

“Hold still, ya brats!” he yells, rearing back to swing at me, but he’s already slow, and even without my spider-sense, I’m fast enough to hop out of the way with no trouble. His rocky mallet of a fist connects with the floor, shattering the concrete.

 

“They always ask us to hold still,” Kitty says, hurrying over and grabbing me in a hug as Sandman lifts his fist in an attempt at some kind of uppercut, but it phases right through us.

 

“ _And even when we do, it never works out_ ,” I add, Kitty giggling a bit and rushing at the Sand man, rearing her own tiny fist back and socking him in the stomach hard enough to send a blast of sand swirling away. Still, Sandman himself remains resolute, the grains of his body coalescing around Kitty’s fist and threatening to pull her in, but she phases through and leaps away, wiggling her hand.

 

“ _Firestar_!” I call. “ _We’re running out of ideas here_!”

 

“I have one!”

 

_FWOOM!_

 

“Gah!” Sandman staggers, a chunk of his sandy body turning to glass and falling to the ground to shatter. He rounds on Jess, who is floating a few inches from the ground, flames curling along her body before wicking away.

 

“I mean, they do always say ‘Kill it with fire’ right?” she says, pulling her hand back and hurling another bolt of flames at the Sandman, who snarls and lunges at her, dissipating the sand as her fireball flies at him, only singeing him before he reforms and throws a punch at her.

 

_Thwip-thwip!_

 

Or he would, if I didn’t web up his fist, yanking it back.

 

“ _Hey, c’mon, just because it’s bright and shiny doesn’t mean we can just touch it_ ,” I insist, yanking his fist back as Jess zips away, taking advantage of his distraction to whip another fireball at him, glassing away more of him.

 

“You fucking punks!” he yells, fluttering away in a wisp and collecting himself outside. We follow, running out the large bay door to see him collecting more sand from the beach area near the wharf, growing larger and larger.

 

“That’s a problem,” Kitty says. I glance around, but other than the small sandbar and a nearby parking area, there isn’t much we can work with. To the right, the bay opens up to the Atlantic Ocean.

 

Wait…water….

 

“ _Firestar, the legs,_ ” I say as an idea forms in my head. “ _Shadowcat, let’s see if we can topple him into the water. I have a feeling this guy can’t swim_.”

 

“On it,” Jess says, zipping up and forming a ball of flame in each hand. She hurls them both at the thick column that is currently Sandman’s legs, and he bellows in rage as the sand glasses and shatters. Meanwhile, Kitty and I run to the little parking area nearby, and I spot a beaten-up green car that’s probably older than me.

 

“This should do,” I say, hoisting it above my head. It’s heavy but nothing that particularly strains me. Getting a running start, I lob the car toward the sandman, who is too distracted by the fact that his legs are literally crumbling beneath him to do much more than turn toward the grunting sound I make as I throw it.

 

For one beautiful moment, it’s just quiet as the car sails through the air, spiraling nicely before it connects.

 

_Whump!_

 

The car collides with our granular foe, and Sandman’s arms windmill in a comically slow and laborious attempt to regain his balance before he tumbles into the water with a resounding splash. The surface froths and bubbles for a long moment, a single muddy hand jutting out before melting down to rivulets of slurry and disappearing again.

 

“Is he dead?” Kitty asks quietly.

 

“ _Let’s not think too much about that_ ,” I say, looking up as Jess calls out to us nervously.

 

“Uh, guys? I think I set the place on fire….”

 

I turn and gasp as I see a plume of smoke rising from the roof of the wharf, the glow of flames flickering in the windows.

 

“ _Baymax, call the fire department_ ,” I say as we run for the building.

 

“ _Calling_ ,” Baymax says.

 

We run back inside to see the office on the second floor is in flames, likely from the fireball that Sandman dodged. At the base of the stairs leading up to it, I see the two unconscious bodies of some of the beaten thugs. I run over and sling one over each shoulder, dragging them outside and well away from the building. Jess comes flying out with a couple more, carefully keeping her upper torso fire-free so as not to burn them. To my surprise, Kitty, comes running out as well with a man over her shoulders.

 

“Turns out when I’m denser, I’m stronger,” she says, carefully depositing the guy. “Weren’t there more?”

 

“ _A few_ ,” I say, hurrying back for the building. I gather up two more of the guys, as does Jess, and we hurry out.

 

“Spidey, I just realized,” she says as we deposit them. “There are an awful lot of chemicals – “

 

_Whump-BOOOOOM!_

Her words are cut off as an explosion bursts from one side of the building, sending debris flying out and filling the air with the putrid smell of burning chemicals.

 

“ _Oh, fuck, KITTY!_ ” I yell, hurrying back for the building, which is collapsing in on itself. I’ve just reached the rubble when Kitty walks through it like it’s not even there, dragging along two intangible thugs.

 

“Secret identity, hello?” she asks, smiling at me.

 

“ _Holy shit, your powers are the best,_ ” I say, yanking her into a hug.

 

“Oh!” she squeaks in surprise, giggling and putting down the two thugs before hugging me back. “Wow, I should get caught in more explosions.”

 

“ _Please don’t_ ,” I say with a small laugh as I pull away. “ _I’m not sure my heart can handle it_.”

 

“And mine sure can’t handle a hug from you, but I deal,” she tells me with a wink. “Here, carry this.”

 

She gestures at one of the unconscious thugs, and we haul them over to the parking lot with the others. I web them up while Jess fusses over Kitty, who assures her that she’s fine and was already phased when the explosion went off.

 

“That was something, huh?” she says, hands on her hips as she surveys the wharf, which is slowly being engulfed in flames, the occasional burst of burning chemicals causing us to jump.

 

That’s gonna require a cleanup crew.

 

“Well, at least we made sure they can’t start this place back up,” Jess says with a little shrug.

 

“ _Yeah, but I bet Wilson Fisk has a fat insurance policy on this building_ ,” I say. “ _I’m sure he’ll find some way to claim he had no idea what it was being used for._ ”

 

“Well, no one said this was gonna be an overnight process,” Kitty says. “We keep going until he has nothing fall back on, then we push him over again. It’s like chess; you don’t topple the king on your second move.”

 

“ _Nice analogy_ ,” I say, and she winks at me from behind her mask.

 

“I’m good for those once in a while,” she says. “C’mon, let’s go knock out a few more pawns, and maybe we’ll find a rook.”

 

……

 

Jubliee would never dream of complaining about this new life she’d stumbled into. When Harry had walked up to her seemingly out of nowhere (ostensibly to ask for gum, but he’d later confessed that he was just looking for an excuse to approach her) and ended up whisking on a cross-country adventure, her life had most certainly changed for the better. Now she was living it up in a New York penthouse, technically a ward of Norman Osborn. There was even talk of her going to Midtown High with Harry next year, though a grade below him, as she had only just turned fourteen a few months ago.

 

Still, patrol nights were a bit boring, and she missed Harry. She had never met someone she clicked with so quickly and effortlessly. And he truly seemed to cherish her, even beyond their mutual love of all things nineties. He listened to her dreams of becoming a gymnast or dancer, of doing something she loved and sharing her passion for it with thousands, maybe inspiring them to follow their own dreams.

 

And, late at night, with the pitch-black of his room to hide the raw ache in her heart, she had confessed to him that she had never truly come to terms with the death of her parents a year ago, the pair gunned down simply for looking like a couple that a hitman had been after. While her quiet whimpering words gave way to babbling sobbing, he just held her and rocked her back and forth, telling her that he could at least sympathize a bit, having lost his mother years ago.

 

“You’ll never be alone again, Jubilee,” he’d said quietly that night. “Promise.”

 

And while she knew he’d meant that statement figuratively, she couldn’t help but think back on it with a bit of a wry smirk as she lounged, surprise, alone, on his couch, watching as the small blips of Harry and his teammates sped around the map of New York, cleaning up the city as part of some altruistic scheme on the part of Harry’s best friend, Peter Parker.

 

Cute guy. Not Jubliee’s type.

 

She couldn’t deny though, he had this sort of Pollyanna, capital G Good streak that made people around him want to do their best to make the world a better place. Even Jubilee had considered more than once asking for a suit like Mary Jane or Harry had, at the very least to keep him company, but after a year of living as a homeless street urchin in Beverly Hills, she was content to enjoy having a place to call home without the complications of life as a vigilante. To their credit, none of the members of this Neighborhood Watch had ever once tried to make her feel guilty for her decision. Peter had even once confided in her that he was glad to take a break from designing gadgets for the team.

 

“Don’t get me wrong, it’s fun, but it gets old fast,” he’d said.

 

She could understand why so many girls found him charming, but he was a little too high-strung sometimes.

 

She hopped to her feet and made her way over to Harry’s DVD collection. Sure, he also had Netflix, but sometimes it was just easier to pop a DVD in. She scanned the titles, humming thoughtfully when she happened upon _Bio-Dome_. Harry and Peter likened this movie to a religious experience, quoting it at each other at the tops of their voices regularly. Gwen had only shaken her head when asked about it.

 

“They watched it when they were like twelve, and it’s just been their bro-movie ever since,” was all she’d said.

 

Well, Jubilee at the very least wanted to see what all the fuss was about.

 

She was just watching the spinning circle as the disk loaded when there was a short knock at the door.

 

“Hm,” she noised curiously, heading for the door. Usually, someone making it past the doorman meant that it was a member of the Neighborhood Watch or a close friend. The Watch was out and about, so that meant…. “Lana?”

 

“Yo, can I come in?” Lana asked from the other side of the door, and Jubilee opened it. Lana stood there in simple jeans and a sweatshirt that she’d once borrowed from Pete and never gave back. “Hey.”

 

“Hey, I was just about to watch a movie,” Jubilee said, stepping back and heading back for the living room.

 

“Did I miss everyone, then?” Lana asked, sighing. “Fucking bus drivers.”

 

“Did you wanna talk to Pete?” Jubilee asked, knowing that Lana had a huge crush on the boy but seemed content with his friendship, at least on the surface. She could tell he was pretty much the most important person in her life, though. “You can use the screen. Baymax has a direct line to him.”

 

“No, it’s fine—Jubilee, it’s fine!” Lana hastened to stop Jubilee as she made her way to the screen despite her protests. “Seriously, I just saw him at school, so – “

 

“Look, I wanted to order a pizza anyway, so just…ask him if he’d be willing to buy, since we’re stuck here while they go fight baddies,” Jubilee said, shrugging. Lana quirked an eyebrow at her.

 

“You want me to message the leader of the Neighborhood Watch asking him to buy us a pizza?” she asked, snickering and turning to the screen. “Baymax.”

 

“ _Good afternoon—Lana,_ ” the screen said. “ _Is there anything I can assist with_?”

 

“Can you get Peter on the line?” Lana asked, and a small window appeared in the corner of the screen with Peter’s face and a little phone symbol next to it. After a couple of little chimes, there was a small clicking sound.

 

“ _This is Pete, what’s up_?” his voice said on the screen.

 

“Hey, Pete,” Lana said, sounding suddenly shy. “Um, how’s it going out there?”

 

“ _Lana_?” he asked. “ _Hey, where were you_?”

 

“My stupid foster mom was all like, ‘Get your weekend homework done now, and you won’t have to worry about it all weekend!’ like you wouldn’t just help me cram it out before school on Monday,” Lana grumbled.

 

“ _I mean, I would, but at least you got it done,_ ” he said. “ _Glad you made it, though. You and Jujube having fun_?”

 

Ugh, the nickname. Jubilee couldn’t even be mad about it, though, because she’d always wanted friends that would give her a stupid affectionate nickname.

 

Be careful what you wish for.

 

“We’re gonna watch a movie,” Lana said.

 

“ _Yeah, which one_?” Pete asked. Lana turned to Jubilee with a questioning glance, and Jubilee sighed, knowing the reaction she would get.

 

“Bio-Dime,” she said, and she was rewarded with a shout.

 

“ _VIVA LOS BIO-DOME_!”

 

“You are a gigantic dork,” Lana grumbled at the screen. Peter just laughed, and Jubilee couldn’t help but notice that dopey grin Lana got at the sound.

 

She was so crazy about this boy.

 

“So, Pete,” Jubilee said.

 

“ _Yes_?” he asked,

 

“Can we get some pizza here?”

 

“ _Um, yeah, I don’t care,_ ” he said, then let a soft little laugh. “ _Unless what you’re really asking is for me to_ buy _you said pizza_?”

 

“It was either you or Harry, and Lana wanted to talk to you because she misses you,” Jubilee said, cackling silently at the mortified look Lana got at her words.

 

“ _Aw, I miss you too, Lana_ ,” he said, and Lana huffed, blushing. “ _Sure, what are we getting, half ham and green olives, half…veggie-lovers, right_?”

 

“You remembered,” Jubillee said, genuinely surprised, and Lana snorted.

 

“He’s sickeningly sweet like that sometimes,” she said. Peter laughed on the screen.

 

“ _You’re making me blush here, Lana_ ,” he said. “ _Alright, we’ve got a thing, so enjoy your pizza. Baymax?_ ”

 

“ _Ordering pizza_ ,” Baymax said.

 

“ _Bye, girls_ ,” Peter said.

 

“Bye,” they said in unison as the call disconnected.

 

“You have it so bad for him, girl,” Jubilee said, and Lana scoffed.

 

“Like that’s even a secret at this point,” she grumbled. “Daddy issues plus sweet, understanding guy with a naturally caring nature? It fucking sucks.”

 

Jubilee shook her head, gesturing back toward the living room. “C’mon, let’s just watch the movie, hm?”

 

They made their way to the living room, and Jubilee started up the movie. After one of the most nineties credits sequences she had ever seen, they were scarcely into the movie proper when the doorbell rang.

 

“Damn, that was fast,” Lana muttered as Jubilee paused the movie and made her way to the door.

 

“I guess someone’s getting a pretty good tip from Peter Parker,” she said as she opened the door, her jaw dropping at the sight waiting for her.

 

“Did I hear the words ‘pretty good tip’? Because if we’re talking about me, that’s embarrassing, and this is a T-rated story. Let’s not kick it up to M already, huh?”

 

The man standing in the doorway was…like no one Jubilee had ever seen. He was tall and well-muscled, and he was wearing a rather form-fitting black suit not unlike the ones Harry and his friends wore on their superhero adventures. Black leather belts and bandoliers crisscrossed his muscles, partially obscuring a white spider logo that took up most of his chest. He wore a black mask with large white circles around the eyes, the mask itself oddly expressive. As he looked down at them, one of the eye things craned up in a quirk of his eyebrow.

 

“Oh! Pizza!” he said, shaking his head. “Sorry, silly me. Now, I hope this isn’t gonna be a repeat of the Tobey Maguire thing where the bitchy receptionist is all like ‘You’re late’ and I get fired by some vaguely Indian guy, because…c’mon, those movies were just ugh, and we all know Tom Holland did it best. Although, Andrew Garfield had his moments, and c’mon, who wouldn’t wanna play little spoon to him?”

 

Jubilee could only stare in awe after this tirade, quietly taking the pizza this guy was holding out. She opened the box, and it was indeed just as ordered, even a bit heavier on the toppings.

 

“Yeah, made sure to hook you guys up,” the delivery guy said, passing her the receipt to sign. “This is a special occasion, right? My first appearance! If you don’t’ count the little early bird cameo back before things really took off. He made me a pizza delivery guy! Not a photographer or even like a mercenary. Pizza! I mean, my thing is normally chimichangas, but I guess I can do pizza.”

 

Blinking, Jubilee just passed him the receipt back, having given him a decent tip for the timely delivery. The guy was a bit weird (he had a baseball cap with the pizza place’s logo perched _over_ his mask), but he got them their pizza fairly quickly, at least.

 

“Yes!” the guy said, looking at the tip. “Suck on _that_ , Weasel! Enjoy your pizza! I’m gonna go have some fun with Spider-Man! Follow me, point-of-view!”

 

With that, he took off.

 

……

 

But you guys are coming with _me_!

 

Trust me, that wasn’t really going anywhere. They’re just gonna watch _Bio-Dome_ and eat pizza. That’s great, and all, but they’re not even gonna make out or anything. Plus, I don’t wanna see what happens when Pauly Shore and Stephen Baldwin start referencing Iron Man _and_ Spider-Man when they’re supposed to be real in this world.

 

Did the author even _think_ about that?

 

No, no he didn’t.

 

Anyway, what’s up, everyone? I know, I know, you’re probably wondering, who _is_ this guy? Wade Wilson is Captain America in this homemade universe, so who’s the guy playing Deadpool? Well, you got a hint last chapter. That wasn’t Black Cat (rawr) mispronouncing my name. I’m Edpool!

 

Yeah, like Deadpool, but Edpool, because I’m Eddie Brock!

 

Wooooaaaah, right!?

 

Hey, if they can make Gwenpool a thing, this isn’t such a stretch. At least my name _rhymes_ with the original.

 

Oh! I’m supposed to tell you what I’m doing. No fancy illustrated panels to show you all of my cool stunts. Okay, so I’m leaping out the window. Yeah, leaping’s a good word.

 

_Kr-crash!_

 

Is that what a breaking window sounds like? Onomatopoeia’s a weird thing. Even the word is weird. Look at it. Onomatopoeia. Hang on, I’ll bold it for you. **Onomatopoeia**.

 

Grappling hook.

 

That’s what I’m doing now, because I totally have a grappling hook to swing me over to the building across from the Osborn penthouse. It’s a nice penthouse. Shame about that broken window, but c’mon, the guy’s probably got an insurance policy on his weird sideways cornrows. Even if he doesn’t have those in this story, which…someone _has_ to have those sometime. Give them to the Red Skull.

 

C’mon, it would be funny!

 

Now, where’s Peter Parker? If I introduce myself to him, he’ll actually think about me when it’s back to his point of view, and then I’ll actually be part of his continuity, so I’ll have a bigger actual part in this story when all the big stuff happens. And with everything he’s about to go through, he’ll need the…Merc with a Mouth?

 

I’m not really a merc yet, though. I mean, I’m trying to track down Kaine, but you guys don’t know why, and I’m so not telling you yet!

 

It’s a secret!

 

Right now, I’m a…Pizza Guy with a…Piehole! Yeah, I like that!

 

Maybe I should just get in touch with Jameson. He’ll just be like, “Get me pictures of that Spider-Man!” and then I’ll have a reason to be stalking Peter Parker.

 

Oh, gosh, maybe senpai will notice me then!

 

I still keep forgetting to let you guys know what I’m _doing_. This is weird! I don’t think there’s ever been an official Deadpool _book_. Who makes comic books into written stories, really?

 

Besides…you know, this guy.

 

Learn to draw, seriously!

 

I faceplant into a wall as I’m leaping across the buildings, falling onto my back and staring up at the gorgeous evening sky. No fair!

 

Alright, we’ll stay on task, _I guess_.

 

New York is so _big_. It has a bigger population than some _states_ , and it’s just a city. And I’m looking for one little spider and his spider pals.

 

Thankfully, the author is going to offer me some contrived coincidence to jump in and make a grand appearance, right?

 

Right?

 

_Crack-BOOM!_

 

More onomatopoeia! Ah, almost had it! Had to auto-correct that one!

 

Let’s…goooooo!

 

That’s an in-joke. Aren’t those just annoying?

 

Alright, time for a fight scene! Let’s get descriptive!

 

I soar majestically into the middle of what looks like an old-fashioned dust-up featuring Spider-Man (senpai!), Firestar (you’re supposed to be Jewel!), and Shadowcat (authors need to stop lusting after you, seriously!). On the opposing side, it’s…hang on, let’s look at the Spider-Man character encyclopedia….

 

Ms. Marvel!

 

No, wait, that makes no sense. She’s the Iron Marvel right now, anyway.

 

No, it’s um…Overdrive! And, uh…Shocker, and Stilt-Man!

 

What kind of stupid nineteen-sixties powers is _stilts_!? Hey, look, I can make my legs really long! I mean, you could just build a flying suit, for real.

 

More description! Spider-Man looks shocked but tremendously relieved to know that Edpool is here to watch his back. I can see it in his mask.

 

“ _Who are you supposed to be_?” he asks with obvious attraction. Oh, Peter, you shouldn’t try to hide it. We’re meant to be!

 

“I’m Edpool,” I say to him. “I’m here to rescue you.”

 

Or I _would_ be, if Stilt-Man didn’t just _kick me to the side and fling me into a building_.

 

What the _hell_ , we were having a moment!

 

I twist in the air, and before I kiss the wall, I manage to recover the moment by tossing a rope at Stilt-Man’s legs, taking advantage of what I’m sure he thought was a very obscure weakness of a guy who’s literally just a set of legs.

 

Really, why wouldn’t you see an attempt at tripping a mile off?

 

Stilt-Man falls, and frankly, given the action-to-word ratio, I’m sure that would all look really awesome if it was a movie, or maybe a _comic_ , but _someone_ doesn’t know how to _draw_.

 

Overdrive runs into me, behind the wheel of a sports car he’s transformed into some kind of super-car or something, because that’s his power, and even in 2007, there were some really weird villains being thought of.

 

He probably thinks he’s just gonna run me over, but if you’ve seen the movie, you know I’m good with cars.

 

And swords.

 

_Shing!_

 

There it is. Sound effects, people. It helps immersion, paints that mental picture. Here, have another for when I’m using the hilt of the sword to smash the windshield.

 

_Crack! Crack! Craasssshhh!_

 

“What the fuck!?”

 

_Screeeeech!_

 

There’s the brakes, but I’m just too quick! I grab the edge of the shattered windshield, reaching in with my other hand to take the wheel and yank it to the right. The car mounts the curb (giggity) and crashes through a mailbox (that’s a federal offense, Overdrive!) before smashing into a wall, setting the airbag off.

 

“And that is why we do safety tests, people! Audi R8, three-and-a- _half_ out of five stars, not stellar but certainly nothing to sneeze unless, like this guy, you’re sneezing up blood.”

 

I yank the door off the car and drag Overdrive out, tossing him onto the pavement as Spidey comes running up.

 

“ _Woah, is he alright_?” he asks.

 

“Oh, he’ll be fine,” I insist. “Your bad guys never seem to die. Heck, they have a whole prison for them to get sent to and escape from. Nice voice modulator, by the way. You sound a bit like Optimus Prime.”

 

“ _Would you believe that’s what I was going for_?” he asks, turning and webbing up Overdrive’s arms as he starts to sit up. In the distance, I see Kitty Pryde (more like Cutie Pryde, am I right?) messing with Shocker’s gauntlet things, using her techno-fuckery phasing powers to ruin thousands of dollars’ worth of technology. Once those are handled, she delivers a solid punch to his head, crumpling him like a ragdoll.

 

“ _That…went fairly well, all things considered_ ,” Spidey says, turning back to me. His neat little eye goggle things blink a few times, and I cover my chest all shy-like.

 

“Oh, gosh, your making me blush,” I tell him.

 

“ _Definitely some kind of healing factor going on here_ ,” he says in that sexy modulated voice of his. “ _You alright, though_?”

 

“I’m just glad to help,” I tell him, reaching into my pocket and pulling out a card before passing it to him. “I’m Edpool. Maybe you’ve heard of me?”

 

Like last chapter?

 

“ _Huh. You know, I actually_ have _,_ ” he says, taking the card and eyeing it before placing his hands on his hips. “ _You’re going after a…person of interest to the Neighborhood Watch_.”

 

Aw, listen to him talking like he’s trying to make this all official.

 

“You mean Kaine?” I ask him. “Yeah, he got his hands on some sensitive merchandise, and not the fun kind.”

 

It’s _never_ the fun kind.

 

“ _What did he get_?” Spidey asks with a tilt of his cute little head.

 

“Oh, a super serum,” I say, shaking my head. “They really need to keep better track of these. Lizard serums, super-soldier serums, Weapon-X serums, it’s always a serum. Even the word just sounds…slimy.”

 

“ _Well…we should get in touch some time, touch base, compare notes_ ,” Spidey says.

 

“Oh, Spider-Man,” I say. “You wanna pass notes _and_ touch bases? How could I ever say no?”

 

He just snorts, shaking his head and holding up the card.

 

“ _I’ll call you if we find anything out_ ,” he says. “ _If you need to contact us, we have a website now. Spider-watch.com_.”

 

“The Neighborhood Watch domain was taken?” I ask, and he sighs.

 

“ _Yes, damn it_ ,” he says. “ _Black Widow ranted for about ten minutes with that one_.”

 

Sirens sound in the distance, and he turns to his two pals, who nod, Kitty Pryde climbing onto his back.

 

Luckyyyyy.

 

“ _Alright, we gotta go, but keep in touch_?”

 

“You bet, Spider,” I say, watching them as they go.

 

“ _X gon’ give it to ya! Gon’ give it to ya!_ ”

 

I whip my phone out of my utility belt, trotting away from the scene as I answer it.

 

“This is Edward.”

 

“So, I just got a call from impound,” Weasel says on the other end. “You really need to stop just ditching the delivery car.”

 

“Weasel, c’mon, these were very important customers!”

 

“You left it on a sidewalk.”

 

“There was plenty of room to walk around it! People are so needy these days. Alright, is it the same one as last time?”

 

“Same guy, too,” Weasel says. “We’re on a first-name basis at this point. He asked me how the pizzeria’s doing.”

 

“Did you tell him about the two-for-ten deal on medium one-topping pies from two to five?” I ask, hailing a taxi. I cover the mouthpiece and speak to the driver. “Impound lot on twenty-sixth and Broadway.”

 

“Yes, I told him about the deal,” Weasel says with a sigh. “It’s _my_ shop, Eddie, I know how to run it.”

 

“You can run it,” I tell him, “but I’ve got a vision. Ollie Osnick’s Old-Fashioned Family Eatery is _not_ going to be the death of us! Just you wait. I’ll get our car back, and we’ll come up with a business plan that’ll put that usurper _out_ of business for _good_! MAXIMUM EFFORT!”

 

I hang up, because people do that in movies all the time. Just finish the conversation, say a few token things like “Meet you at eight”, end the call, done.

 

At least I left an impression.

 

Anyway, I’ve got a pretty boring cab ride ahead of me, and I’m probably gonna beat up a government employee until he gives me Weasel’s car back, and that’s going to be unpleasant! You might even be able to read about if this guy actually makes me into a story of my own.

 

For now, why don’t you go see what Harry’s doing?

 

……

 

“ _Silver Surfer to Spidey, you busy_?” Harry asked into his communicator.

 

“ _This is Spidey, what’ve we got?_ ” Pete’s voice came back.

 

“ _Alright, so we tailed this buy back to his apartment, but now he’s just in there like watching TV or something_ ,” Harry said, tapping the side of his mask to get the thermal camera going and zooming in. “ _Pretty sure he’s yanking it_.”

 

“ _Definitely yanking it_ ,” Johnny said, sighing and settling back, staring up at the sky.

 

“ _Charming,_ ” Pete said. “ _Alright, tag his vehicle with a spider-tracer, and I’ll have Baymax track his movements, see if we can figure out other haunts he has. Good work, you two_.”

 

“ _Yo, does that mean we can go beat up some thugs now_?” Harry asked, earning a small chuckle from Johnny and Pete.

 

“ _There’s a chop shop we need to hit, probably full of bad guys you can beat up_ ,” Pete told Harry. “ _Want me to mark it for you_?”

 

“ _Fuck yeah, let’s go wreck some days_ ,” Harry said. “ _Johnny, you down_?”

 

“ _Bro, I love this vigilante shit_ ,” he said. “ _We should hit up some falafels on the way, though. I’m starving._ ”

 

“ _Marking the nearest falafel stand on the way to the chop shop as well_ ,” Pete said wryly, and two waypoints appeared on Harry’s HUD.

 

“ _You’re the best, Pete_ ,” Johnny said, and Harry tapped a little button on his wrist. With a muted humming sound, his hoverboard zoomed to his side. He climbed on, eyeing his reflection briefly in the gleaming silver surface of the board. When Gwen had proposed the idea of Silver Surfer as his next superhero identity, Harry had taken to the idea with what Peter called “gusto”. His armor looked similar to MJ’s though a shining silver instead of her mix of red, black, and gold, and he had a full facemask right out of a Star Wars game, complete with a shining green T shape for his eyepiece.

 

“You look like Boba Fett’s badass cousin,” Riley had said, which Harry had wholeheartedly agreed with.

 

Harry was just thankful he’d met Jubilee before this whole business with Riley; he had no doubt that, if he didn’t have a girlfriend to hold his attention and affection, he would have fallen hardcore for Riley.

 

And that would have sucked. A lot.

 

Riley was his best male friend’s brain in a girl body. Said male friend was not into guys in any way at all but also had so much in common with Harry that Harry would probably be helpless to stop himself from at least a hardcore crush of some kind. Any time he found himself thinking too hard about this, though, he just remembered his banging hot Asian beauty back home. Jubilee also had a whole lot in common with Harry and came without the emotional baggage of being a gender-swapped clone.

 

And there was a _lot_ of emotional baggage with that.

 

When did life get so strange?

 

While Johnny flew above him, he sped between the buildings toward their destination, his hoverboard reacting to his every movement like he’d been doing this his whole life. Pete had told him that he’d compiled hundreds of skate videos into a solid control matrix for the board and that if Harry knew anything about skateboarding, controlling the board should be a no-brainer for him.

 

It had definitely been a challenge, and it had been one Harry had risen to eagerly. On the first flight, Pete and Riley hadd both been impressed with his ability to control the board. Even Harry had to admit, he’d taken to it faster than he’d thought he would have. Even now, as he steered the board through the city, he sometimes forgot that he had had his powers removed what felt like so long ago.

 

Maybe some of it had stuck with him? Hopefully not all of it. He missed his powers, but he definitely didn’t want to put his friends through the whole murderous Hulk-spider thing.

 

Again.

 

That and the whole Venom thing had made for one of the worst weekends in Harry’s life.

 

“ _Dusk to Spidey, falafel stand in sight, moving in to intercept_ ,” Johnny said, and Harry heard Pete laugh in his earpiece.

 

“ _Spidey to Dusk, clear to move in_ ,” he said. “ _Try not to make_ too _much of a scene_.”

 

“ _Where the Neighborhood Watch goes, there’s_ always _a scene, bro_ ,” Johnny told him, earning another laugh.

 

It would be easy to be jealous of Johnny and Pete’s obvious friendship, but Harry owed Pete too much to get all pissy over something as simple as him having a few friends besides him. Harry knew where he stood with Pete, and that was all that mattered.

 

Besides, Johnny was pretty cool. He played a mean bass guitar at Rock Band, too. Plus, he was into the millennial Punk scene, and that meant that he and Harry just had to be friends. Too few guys his age were into the music he listened to, and the ones that were tended to be the pretentious hipster elitists that looked down on anyone that listened to anything that was made while they were alive, like there was some Boy Scout badge you got from liking music that you weren’t “supposed to”.

 

Harry just liked 2000s punk music. Big deal.

 

arJHWhile he and Johnny enjoyed some falafels purchased from one of the most befuddled vendors Harry had ever had the pleasure to see, Harry surveyed the city. They had, of course, drawn a bit of crowd while they were getting their food, some even taking pictures and videos. He had no doubt that they would get a small blurb on the evening news, but Harry loved the coverage. Pete wasn’t one to want to draw attention to them, but Harry felt these little moments went a long way to getting people to see that they were just fellow New Yorkers looking to make the city a better place. The superhero mystique was great and all, but it could also be intimidating if you didn’t show the citizens that you were also one of them. More than anything, Harry wanted to show them that the Silver Surfer was on their side. The Tarantula had established such a reputation, but he had been retired. Harry didn’t really want to step back into that particular costume, especially after –

 

“Holy shit, Harry, what is that?” Johnny asked, his mask up as they chowed down on their food. Harry looked to where he was pointing, feeling a chill run up his spine at the sigh that greeted him. It couldn’t be….

 

“No…” he breathed. “Aw, fuck no.”

 

Perched across the street, crouching low on the rooftop, a hulking creature stared at him with eight glowing green eyes. Seeming to sense his gaze, it lumbered onto four feet, but four angular limbs curled above it, unfurling like spider legs.

 

Harry yanked his mask back down over his face. “ _Spidey, problem_ ,” he said, tapping the distress beacon on his wrist.

 

“ _What’s wrong_?” Pete came back, quick and urgent.

 

“ _Venom_ ,” Harry said, and Pete was quiet for a moment.

 

“ _You mean…_ that _Venom_?” he asked.

 

“ _Yes,_ that _Venom_ ,” Harry replied.

 

“ _But…we toasted him_ ,” he said. “ _I was there, I saw it_.”

 

“ _Well, you must’ve missed a spot, because there’s a—fuck, he’s moving_ ,” Harry said, hopping onto his board.

 

 _“What’s going on_?” Johnny asked, spreading his wings and diving after Harry as he sped across the gap between the buildings. “ _Isn’t that the thing that, like…possessed you or something_?”

 

“ _Yeah, and it looks like we didn’t quite get rid of it_ ,” Harry said, scanning the rooftops ahead of them. It couldn’t have gotten far…. There! He dove, his board zooming along ever faster as Johnny flew along beside him.

 

“ _Harry, be careful_ ,” Pete said. “ _We’re on our way, but we’re just outside of Jersey, so we’ll be a bit_.”

 

“ _I’m on him,_ ” Riley’s voice came in, and Harry saw her webbing along the street near them, landing and dashing across a rooftop before leaping up to a landing on Harry’s board. Crouching, she clutched onto his leg, her other hand gripping the board tightly. “ _I was in the neighborhood. Flash? Bobby?_ ”

 

“ _We’re on our way_ ,” Bobby’s voice came over the comm. “ _Flash zapped his earpiece again. Back to the drawing board, Pete_.”

 

“ _Terrific,_ ” Pete muttered. “ _Alright, Riley, you know the drill. We’re heading your way_.”

 

“ _Keep your distance, don’t let it touch you_ ,” Riley said, like Harry needed reminding. “ _Flash, we really need you guys to get here in a hurry. Your lightning’s gonna be the most handy until we can get Jess involved. Pete, you should think about –_ “

 

“ – _Stopping by Oscorp to see if they have some kind of containment thing_ ,” Pete finishes for her.

 

“ _We can do that_ ,” Gwen’s voice spoke up. “ _Pete, can we use Baymax from our communicator thingie?_ ”

 

“ _I can make that happen_ ,” Pete said.

 

“ _Okay, we’ll see what we can find_ ,” Gwen said. “ _Tony must have left behind something we can use_.”

 

“ _Harry, you alright?_ ” Riley asked as they sped along, watching the hulking bastard that had wormed its way into Harry’s entire being for two disturbing hours as it lumbered along the rooftops, leaping over gaps and hurtling across rooftops.

 

“ _We’re ready this time_ ,” he said with a nod. “ _Let’s beat that thing’s drippy ass_.”

 

“ _If it ever stops_ ,” Johnny muttered. “ _I think he’s got somewhere to be_.”

 

They continued to pursue Venom, zooming along silently behind the monster as it sped along. Harry was terrified, of course; hosting Venom had been one of the worst times of his life, but he also knew that his friends would be there to help this time around, and he would be able to help them. Things were different now.

 

“ _He’s visiting Central Park_?” Riley asked as they crossed over into the wooded area, the sounds of the city fading as the buildings shifted abruptly to trees and lit paths. “ _Tourists_.”

 

“ _Probably a litterbug, too_ ,” Johnny said, as they swooped over the treetops. Through the foliage, Harry could see Venom slowing, though he didn’t think for a second it was out of exhaustion. The creature strolled to a halt, turning and snarling up at them, still on all fours.

 

“ _Why isn’t it saying anything_?” Riley asked as they swooped in, hovering in front of the creature, several yards away. “ _It was way chattier last time_.”

 

“ _Look at it,_ ” Johnny said, his wingsuit flapping slowly as he pointed at Venom. “ _It looks like…a bear_.”

 

Indeed, it did, though a massive bear with eight glowing green eyes, long, gnashing teeth, a slavering sinuous tongue, and a few extra legs. As they studied it, it seemed to be studying them right back, pacing left to right.

 

“ _It’s latched onto a bear now_?” Riley asked. “ _I didn’t think it could do that._ _Maybe it needs a host that can actually speak if it wants to_?”

 

“Ngrah!” the bear-Venom snarled at them, and for the first time, Harry noticed a reddish growth sprouting from between the four extra legs on its back. The thing was pulsating a bit, fused to Venom by a twisting mass of red and black.

 

“ _I’m gonna agree_ ,” Johnny said, glancing at Riley. “ _What’s the plan_?”

 

“ _Contain it_ ,” Riley said. “ _If we try to burn it up like last time, it’ll just do whatever voodoo it did to reform again. We lock it up, throw away the key_.”

 

“ _So, hold it off until Gwen and MJ get here with whatever containment thing Stark hopefully came up with_ ,” Johnny said. He swooped in lower, and Venom growled audibly, a low, rumbling sound that no natural bear would ever make. Its spindly legs thrashed toward him, but they bounced fruitlessly off of Johnny’s barrier as he landed. Seconds later, a translucent bubble appeared around Venom, earning a roar of rage as the symbiote-infested bear reared back and struck at the barrier.

 

“Nyargh!” it roared as it smacked at its prison, ripples shooting over the surface as Johnny raised a hand, fingers twisted in effort.

 

“ _I won’t be able to hold it for long_!” he said. “ _It’s powerful_!”

 

“ _Alright, Harry, you’ve got those sound repulsors, so if it tries to break perimeter, hit it_ ,” Riley said, leaping from the hoverboard and landing near the barrier as the bear shattered through it, the creature snarling in rage is it ran at her.

 

“ _Hey, Smoky_!” she yelled. “ _Don’t you have a forest fire to put out somewhere_!?”

 

She leapt nimbly away as the bear charged, landing and taking aim.

 

_THWIP-THWIP!_

 

The bear’s legs were suddenly bound together, and it toppled to the ground, roaring and thrashing, one of its back legs curling down to slice at the webbing. The other three stayed protectively around the growth on its back, keeping it from even touching the grass. As it stood, the red mass shifted a bit, wiggling and seeming to flatten and widen against Venom’s back.

 

“ _What’s that thing on its back_?” Johnny asked, forming another barrier around Venom to try to buy some time, Harry figured.

 

“ _This might sound nuts, but…I think it’s pregnant_ ,” Harry said, swooping down.

 

“ _Athena_ ,” Harry heard Riley say. “ _Scan for…life signs_?”

 

“ _You have an AI, too_?” Harry asked, swooping down next to her. She shrugged.

 

“ _It’s self-contained, just in my helmet, so she and Baymax don’t have to share the network and confuse each other_ ,” she says. “ _But…I guess I wanted to make my own. Also, don’t fly too low. Stay where it can’t reach you and sound-blast it_.”

 

“ _Incoming_!” Johnny yelled, grunting as his barrier was destroyed a second time, and the Venom-bear charged at them again. Harry held his hand out.

 

_Kreeng-WHOOM!_

 

The bear thing snarled, black tendrils sent writhing along it as the soundwaves caused it to stumble and shrink away, bouncing off a barrier from Johnny. Growling low, it thrashed against the newest barrier, which was noticeably weaker than the last ones, Johnny visibly panting with the exertion of keeping a third one up.

 

“ _Johnny, don’t strain yourself_!” Riley yelled. “ _Harry, I’m gonna web it up, you just keep sound-blasting it_.”

 

“ _Got it_ ,” Harry said, banking and taking to the air, arcing over the bear and holding his hands out, ready to blast. Riley signaled Johnny, who dropped his barrier and took to the skies. The bear let a rumbling roar, mouth opening unnaturally wide as its slavering tongue thrashed at her. For her part, Riley stared unflinchingly back.

 

“ _Yeah, yeah, heard it all before_ ,” she said, firing a web at the monster, but to their shock, Venom leapt out of the way this time, faster than Harry could track.

 

“ _What the-agh_!” Riley grunted, barely hopping out of the way in time as she was caught by a swipe from a massive bear paw. “ _Gah, fuck! Gwen, how we doing with –_ “

 

She was cut off by a rush overhead, and with a heavy _thud_ that Harry could even feel on his hoverboard, a suit of armor landed in the small clearing.

 

“ _What the…ass?_ ” he asked, staring down at the metal monster that had just landed in their midst.

 

“ _My thoughts exactly_ ,” Riley said in a limp voice.

 

“ _Guys, meet Veronica_ ,” MJ said, sounding absolutely giddy over the comm. “ _She’s big, beautiful, and ready to kick some symbiote ass_!”

 

Veronica was apparently the name of the suit, which was humongous, big enough to make the Iron Goblin look like a child next to it. It was painted up red and gold, Tony’s signature color scheme, and it was sporting about seven arc reactors, three in the chest and one in each limb.

 

“ _What the hell was Veronica meant to fight_!?” Johnny asked, swooping in and scooping up Riley to deposit her on Harry’s hoverboard. She clutched to Harry’s leg again, her other arm curled around her side.

 

“ _Whatever the fuck she wants to_!” MJ responded, pulling a fighting stance and bearing down on Venom. “ _The important bit is she has an onboard symbiote containment unit, which is just what we need_.”

 

The bear creature snarled, gnashing its teeth and shifting on its paws. Harry thought for a moment that it would charge Veronica in some wild attempt at a fight…but instead, it turned and took off into the trees.

 

“ _Gwen_!” Riley shouted. “ _Web it_!”

 

_THAWP-THAWP!_

 

“ _It’s fast_!” Gwen said, tearing into the trees after it as her webs shot ineffectively at a couple of trees. She leaped from trunk to trunk as Harry sped along above them, holding out his hand and activating the spotlight function, shining it into the foliage. Behind them, Veronica took to the skies with a rumbling sound of repulsor exhaust.

 

_THAWP-THAWP!_

 

“ _How is it this fast_!?” Gwen shouted. Behind and above Harry, he heard MJ soaring over him, scanning the trees.

 

“ _Got him!_ ” she yelled, swooping down and sending leaves and twigs flying as she broke through the canopy with a rustle of foliage. Harry sped after her, spotting her landing and intercepting the bear with a _clang_ of gnashing teeth against metal. He raised his hands.

 

_Kreeng-WHOOM!_

 

The bear bellowed in pain, snarling and snapping at Harry, who zoomed out of range.

 

“ _Riley, hanging in there_?” he asked, and Riley laughed softly into her comm.

 

“ _I’m fine, Squirrely_ ,” she said, and Harry chuckled. They looked down to see MJ tangling with the Venom-bear, Gwen webbing it down to slow it enough that a giant metal hand could come in and swat at it. Unfortunately, the symbiote was apparently studying Gwen’s movements, slashing at her webs with a tendril as fast as she was firing them.

 

“ _I can’t get a bead on it_!” Gwen said. “ _It’s…fuck_!”

 

The symbiote leapt back to the woods, putting on a burst of speed, and Harry sped after it, but it was in the trees now, hiding among the leaves. The light wind meant that they couldn’t even follow the movement of its passage through the branches.

 

“ _It doesn’t turn up on any thermal scans_ ,” MJ said frantically. “ _I don’t think it even has body heat_.”

 

“ _Damn it_!” Riley said, leaping from Harry’s hoverboard and webbing into the trees. Harry zoomed down after her, avoiding tree trunks as Riley and Gwen searched fruitlessly through the woods. Even MJ shined a spotlight from the suit, lighting up the trees and washing them of color with bright white light. They searched for upwards of fifteen minutes, scouring the trees and startling more than a few woodland creatures, but Venom was gone, it seemed.

 

“ _How did it do that_?” Gwen asked, frustration in her voice as they all gathered near MJ in her armor. “ _It wasn’t near that fast when we first got here_.”

 

“ _Adrenaline_ ,” Harry said, blinking as hazy memories floated back from his time with Venom. “ _I think it like gets off on adrenaline or something. The bear half was probably freaking out_.”

 

“ _Maternal instincts, I bet_ ,” Riley said, sounding just as irate as Gwen. “ _It picks up traits from its hosts, and if it’s pregnant, the Mama Bear half must’ve bubbled up._ ”

 

“ _So, what now_?” Johnny asked, and Riley sighed.

 

“ _Alright, let’s pack it in for the night_ ,” she decided. “ _Pete_?”

 

“ _What happened_?” Pete asked over the comm. “ _Did you lose him_?”

 

“ _Yeah, I think we should probably head back.”_

_“Reconvene, strategize?”_

_“Maybe have Baymax try tracking this thing?”_

_“I can probably tap him into Google maps, like Tony did that time.”_

_“I can have Athena slave the Chameleon bots.”_

_“Can you two have this conversation in person, because I’m about to crash into a building listening to you_ ,” Bobby said, and Pete and Riley both allowed a small chuckle.

 

“ _C’mon, let’s get back to my place_ ,” Harry said, shaking his head. “ _Riley, hop on. You’re hurt_.”

 

“ _I can manage_ – “

 

“ _When have I ever let you ‘manage’ before_?” Harry asked, and Riley rolled her eyes, no doubt remembering all the times Harry’s schemes had led to an injured Pete, the skateboarding incident the most memorable.

 

“ _I’m not Pete, remember_?” she asked even as she climbed not his hoverboard.

 

“ _I don’t care if you’re Pete or Riley_ ,” Harry said, “ _you’re my best bud, and I’ll always carry you back home to patch you up_.”

 

“ _You’re gonna make me cry again, and I hate you_ ,” she said, and Harry just chuckled.

 

……

 

“ _Bay­_ max,” I say, my voice returning to normal as I yank my mask off, stepping into the penthouse. “Status on Veronica.”

 

“ _Veronica—has been returned to Oscorp_ ,” Baymax says from the monitor on the wall. I make my way to the couch nearby and flop onto it, Jess strolling over and settling onto my left side. I lean back, pressing the heels of my hands to my forehead. “ _Mary Jane and—Gwen—are on their way_.”

 

“Alright, start looking for any satellites with a good view of New York City and around it,” I say while Riley unplugs a small device from her belt and fits it into one of the USB slots on what has become her laptop.

 

“Athena, I want every Chameleon bot in the city on the lookout for the symbiote,” she says to her screen.

 

“ _Interfacing_ ,” Athena says.

 

I drop my hands to see Jess peering up at me with a small consoling smile. She reaches up and brushes a stray fringe of hair away from my face.

 

“We’ll get him,” she says. “Next time, we’ll have the whole Watch ready to kick his gooey butt.”

 

“This is the worst possible time this could happen, too,” I say, looking up as Lana and Jubilee stroll in from the kitchen, having apparently been grabbing some snacks. They look mildly surprised at our sudden arrival for a moment before Lana heads over and settles in on my other side while Jubilee hurries to hug Harry.

 

“Hey, babe,” Harry says, squeezing her.

 

Lana’s fingers drift over the back of my hand, and she glances up at the huge display, where Kitty is doing some poking, dismissing the map and bringing up the Persons of Interest interface before setting up a Most Wanted profile for Venom.

 

“So, what’s happening?” Lana asks quietly, seeming oddly timid. “Is this about that big black thing that was on the news a while back?”

 

“Yeah,” I say, sighing. “I thought we got rid of it. Evidently, I was wrong.”

 

“That’s the worst part about this whole thing,” Riley adds. “We just don’t understand it enough to know how to handle it. It hates high-frequencies and fire and can turn into a viscous liquid. That’s all we have.”

 

“We can trap it, though,” Harry says, settling into a seat nearby and pulling Jubilee into his lap. “Lock it away, keep it from causing any more shit.”

 

“We have to find it first,” I tell him. The penthouse door opens, and Bobby and Flash join us, Flash making a beeline for the kitchen.

 

“Osborn, raiding your fridge, bro,” he says, the door swinging shut behind him.

 

“Just don’t touch my teriyaki pork, I got plans for that,” Harry calls back.

 

“Are you gonna make a teriyaki pork omelet?” Jubilee asks, sounding equal parts disgusted and intrigued.

 

“I’m gonna do my best,” he says, and Jubilee just snorts.

 

“That sounds disgusting,” she says with a giggle. “I can’t wait to see it.”

 

“Alright, so we’re just waiting on Gwen and MJ, then?” I ask, standing and joining Kitty next to the screen just as the door opens once more.

 

“Not for long,” Gwen’s voice says, sighing and shaking her head as MJ passes her, pouting toward me.

 

“I’m sorry, Pete, I tried to – “

 

“It’s no one’s fault it got away,” I assure her, and she smiles, trotting tiredly over to hug me before flopping into the spot I vacated on the couch. Gwen makes her way over and wraps me tightly in a hug as well, kissing me gently.

 

“Hey,” she says. “You alright?”

 

“As alright as I can be with all this,” I say, turning to the assembled members of the Watch. “Are we all here, then?”

 

“Yo,” Flash says, emerging from the kitchen with a massive sandwich and a huge bottle of Gatorade. “Now I see why you guys pack away so much food. Superheroing takes a lot out of you.”

 

“Just to bring you guys up to speed,” I say, and Kitty taps away at the screen, which shows a couple pictures of Venom, one taken during his first rampage with Harry and a blurry still from the camera mounted on Veronica, “this is some kind of alien parasite thing that calls itself Venom. It latches onto a host and enhances their physical abilities, but it also causes crazy amounts of aggression as a tradeoff. Judging from the spider-legs this bear thing had, I’m gonna guess that it also retains physical features of its hosts.”

 

“It’s also pregnant or something,” Harry adds, and I nod.

 

“That’s the best guess right now,” I say, pointing at the red growth on Venom’s back. “That means that there may be two of these things running around soon, and we don’t want that to happen. So for the rest of the weekend and until we catch this thing, we’re gonna have to put the vigilante stuff on a shelf and track this thing down.”

 

“We’re not gonna fight crime?” Bobby asks. “I thought that’s what this was about.”

 

“If we don’t stop this thing, there’ll be something way more dangerous than some thugs running around New York,” I say. “I know it sucks, but it’s the lesser of two evils.”

 

“Um,” Riley says, holding a hand up. “I…know some people that can take over crime-fighting detail for the weekend.”

 

I stared at her for a short moment, not sure if I heard right. “Um…who?”

 

“It’s kind of a bit of a story,” she says. “I can tell you when this is all over and we have more time, but I just met them tonight, and…they’re enthusiastic, but new.”

 

“Do you know like who they actually – “

 

“It’s Cindy Moon and some…kids,” Riley says. “I mean, they’re like thirteen, but they all apparently got bit by spiders.”

 

“All of them?” Gwen asks, blinking and looking between Riley and me. “Well…okay, that’s not such a stretch, but still….”

 

“So, wait…Cindy Moon from school and…how many kids?”

 

“Four kids. A girl and three boys.”

 

“So, Cindy Moon has started her own like Power Rangers spider team or something?”

 

“Apparently, they’ve been at it a week or so,” Riley says, shrugging. “It’s weird, yes, but it’s happening. I met them earlier tonight.”

 

“Where did the spiders come from?” Jess asks. “I thought you guys said they caught all of them.”

 

“ _Most_ of them,” Harry adds, looking just as confused about this development as I feel. At least I’m not the only one. “Dad said a few got away.”

 

“Look, we can worry about the origin story later,” Riley says, holding her hands up. “Right now, we need a B-Team, and one’s been handed to us. I can…I can sit this one out and coach them, if I need to.”

 

“You’ll be anxious the entire time,” I tell her, and she shrugs.

 

“I’ll just keep reminding myself you’re spearheading this search party,” she says, smirking. “That’s _almost_ as good as if I was doing it.”

 

“Oh, is that how it’s gonna be?” I ask with a small grin, folding my arms. I’m unable to deny, though, that I feel a bit relieved that New York will still have a team to look after her, led by my distaff counterpart.

 

Yes, I specifically looked up that phrase after learning about Riley’s existence.

 

“Okay, so the Watch is hunting Venom and its weird tumor-baby,” Harry says, glancing over to Riley. “And you’re gonna lead a crack team of Spider Power Rangers to defend New York?”

 

“Does anyone else feel like we’re in a Call of Duty cutscene?” Bobby asks, glancing at all of us. “I just feel a real video game vibe going on right now.”

 

“This would be a sick video game,” Flash says with a laugh before looking up toward me. “So, what now?”

 

“Right now, it’s late, and we should get some sleep,” I say with a sigh, glancing back the monitor. “Baymax, wake us if Venom shows up.”

 

“ _Understood, Peter_ ,” Baymax says.

 

Gwen smiles and latches onto my arm, dragging me toward the room we’ve taken to sharing during Watch events. MJ and Jess linger, chit-chatting and overall trying not to make it obvious that they intend to sneak in when everyone else has cleared out.

 

“You okay?” Gwen asks again as we step into the room, and I immediately detach from her to step out of my costume, heading for the little shower attached to the bedroom.

 

“Is it cool if I just…process this in the shower?” I ask turning back to her, and she smiles, not bothering to hide the way her eyes look me up and down in my state of undress.

 

“Sure, but if you’re in there for longer than an hour, I’m coming in for you,” she says with a wink, and I snort, rolling my eyes before stepping into the bathroom. This one doesn’t quite have the extravagant shower of the master bathroom, but it’s still a nice setup, and over the past couple weeks, it’s amassed four sets of toiletries, MJ and Jess having unofficially moved in as well.

 

We really should take steps toward going public with this whole thing, I muse as I step into the shower, shutting the door and turning on the hot water. My trio of girlfriends (which is still just weird to think, let alone speak about) seem to be getting along famously, and none of them look like they’re regretting this little endeavor. MJ has even joked a few times about adding girls to the “roster”, a thought that is equal parts nerve-wracking but…intriguing.

 

Hey, a guy can speculate in a wholesome way, purely out of scientific interest, right?

 

Lathering up a shower poof thing (which are just superior to washcloths or sponges, and I’ll fight anyone who disagrees), I set about washing away the sweat of a long evening of crime-fighting in skintight clothing. At least it was a productive night, up until the whole Venom thing.

 

I can’t believe it’s back. We burned that thing to cinders and then burned the cinders. The Human Torch himself oversaw its destruction, but it apparently came back. How sturdy is this thing? It seems to have gotten stronger, judging by its ability to hold off a good half of the Neighborhood Watch and escape. What if it continues to get stronger while we’re tracking it down? If we do manage to find it and confront it, will it be some monstrous Cthulhu monster, a mass of tentacles ready to exact some kind of cosmic revenge on us?

 

Just as I’m starting to build up a bit of a panic at the thought of fighting this off again, I reassure myself that it only got this strong after several weeks in which we presumed it dead. We have containment measures in place and about a dozen superheroes ready to fight it into submission this time around.

 

We can do this.

 

Hopefully.

 

Maybe it wouldn’t hurt to shoot Tony an e-mail, ask if he’s got any help to offer.

 

He just _had_ to go on his hush-hush overseas mission _now_. He couldn’t wait until after the insane space-goo-monster chose to make its dramatic reappearance. Now I have to use the stuff he left behind to improvise. At the very least, he should be proud if I manage to pull of some kind of victory.

 

Yeah, Tony, let’s see your reaction when you see your “protégé” show you how it’s done.

 

I shampoo and rinse before turning off the water, stepping out and toweling off before pulling on some shorts and t-shirt to sleep in. I emerge from the bathroom into our bedroom and see Gwen, Jess, and MJ all chilling on my bed. Jess is texting someone while MJ and Gwen watch a movie on the TV in our room.

 

“Star Wars?” I ask.

 

“The Force Awakens,” Gwen says, standing and skipping over to wrap me in another hug, kissing me softly. “All processed?”

 

“Doing better,” I say, kissing her again.

 

“We can beat this thing, you know,” she insists. “We’re better prepared, stronger, and ready for it.”

 

“I know,” I say, smiling at her. “But you stick close to me so he doesn’t hospitalize you like last time.”

 

“Like I’m looking for an _excuse_ to stick close to you,” she giggles, kissing me one more time. “Okay, my turn to shower since MJ hasn’t seen this movie yet.”

 

I turn to see MJ engrossed in the movie, but she pauses it briefly to smile up at me as she crawls up to her knees on the mattress.

 

“Kisses,” she says in a singsong voice, pulling me down for a smooch. “Mmmmwah!”

 

“Red card,” I call with a smirk. “Aggressive use of tongue.”

 

“You loved it,” she says, settling back into her movie. I just chuckle and flop onto the bed next to Jess, who smiles and crawls over onto my lap, settling against me and nestling into my chest.

 

“Who you texting?” I ask, looking down at her, and she hums softly against me.

 

“Phil,” she says. “They’re all settled in back in New York. Actually, they don’t live that far from your place. You should visit sometime. Mom always loved you.”

 

“I think maybe I will,” I tell her. She smiles and plants a little kiss on my jaw.

 

“It was actually kinda fun fighting crime with you,” she says. “Seeing you being all hero, I think I know why Kitty has such a giant crush on you.”

 

“Oh my gosh, doesn’t she, though?” MJ asks, pausing the movie again and rolling onto her side to grin over at us. “And, like…Pete wearing her as a backpack on every patrol sure isn’t helping.”

 

“It’s kinda hard to build her a flight system when she fucks it up the first time she uses her powers,” I say defensively, and they both snicker, Jess planting a soft little kiss on my lips.

 

“Pete, we’re not mad or anything,” she says. “It’s cute. She’s not like insanely jealous of Gwen or anything, and she’s actually a sweet girl. She was really nice when I joined the X-Men, helping me settle in and stuff. I like her.”

 

“Between her and Lana, it’s…awkward at times,” I say, and Jess shakes her head against me.

 

“You are a sweet, caring guy that also happens to be a superhero and doesn’t have a mean bone in his body,” she says. “It’s no wonder a few girls have taken notice. But especially with Lana, I think…it’s okay to maybe show her a bit more affection. She’s had a rough life, and ever since that thing with her mom, Gwen says she’s been a lot…better. She laughs more, she doesn’t cuss nearly as much, and….”

 

“She’s happier,” MJ adds. “I’ve noticed, too. You’re a good influence on her, so keep it up.”

 

“And once this whole Venom thing is over, take Gwen out on a date, just the two of you,” she says. “And MJ. And…maybe be. Just each of us gets a night with you all to ourselves.”

 

“I think I can manage that,” I say with a smile, and she leans in, smirking as she kisses me again.

 

“Not getting overwhelmed, are you?” she asks, and I shake my head.

 

“You guys seem to have this whole thing figured out, and I’m just along for the ride,” I say.

 

“Is that so bad?” she asks.

 

“It’s a hell of a ride,” is all I say, and she giggles, nuzzling my chest. She’s really warm, likely due to the fire powers, but having her snuggling into my side is rather nice, and the familiar sounds of MJ’s movie playing the background and her warmth at my side are enough to have me dozing in short order. I rouse a bit when a familiar whisper speaks nearby.

 

“Is he asleep?” Gwens’ voice asks softly.

 

“Looks like it,” Jess says with a small laugh that shakes me gently. “Sorry, I think I conked him out with my body heat.”

 

“No, he deserves some rest,” Gwen replies.

 

“M’awake,” I mutter blearily, opening my eyes and seeing Gwen looking down at me with a little smile. She leans in and presses a gentle kiss to my forehead.

 

“Get some sleep, silly,” she says. “We all need it after the day we’ve had.”

 

She crawls in on my other side, and I’m playing little spoon to Jess while Gwen nestles in against my front. MJ is consigned to the outside, but given that she’s spent more than a few nights at my place (rather sneakily) with Gwen, she doesn’t seem terribly upset, and the bed is enormous, leaving plenty of room for all of us.

 

I have just enough time to muse that there are men that would kill to be where I am right now before sleep takes me.


	8. Chapter 8

Monday mornings have always held some certain amount of dread for me. I mean, I’m a teenager in an ever-changing educational world full of standardized tests, common core teachings, and increasingly jaded teachers. Having to return to that drudgery every week would wear on any student.

I only wish that was all I had to worry about these days.

Now, my Monday-morning worry is the fact that despite a whole weekend spent searching for the alien symbiote that my friend once hosted, we’re no closer to finding it than we were when we first found that it was not only still alive but pregnant with some twisted red offspring.

Yeah, it’s been an eventful few days.

“Pete, why are you awake already?”

I turn away from the giant window in the Osborn penthouse living room, seeing Gwen standing there in a nightshirt that falls to her mid-thigh, showing off those legs that have been known to distract me from a number of “inventing binges”. She smiles at me, stepping up and wrapping me in a hug before kissing me softly. She’s still warm from being curled up under the blankets, and she carries that strange but amazing scent that I’ve come to associate with dark but cozy nights curled up under the blankets with her, like our two essences have mingled long enough to just become something in and of itself. Closing my eyes, I nuzzle into her neck, inhaling a whiff, and it makes me want to just crawl under the blankets with her and sleep until all of this has blown over.

But we can’t do that. We’re the ones that shuffle the bad stuff aside, that do the “blowing over” for others to enjoy days free of trouble.

“Couldn’t sleep,” I say in response to her question. “This is…. Gwen, I hate that it’s out there.”

“We’ll stop it,” she says with such assuredness that I can’t help but feel a bit better. “Pete, there is nothing out there that we can’t stop with our friends helping us out.”

“Okay, but what about a tidal wave?” I ask with a quirk of the eyebrow, and Gwen rolls her eyes.

“Shut up,” she says with a giggle, tapping me on the chest and leaning in for another kiss. “Do you still wanna skip school today?”

“I have to,” I say, shaking my head. “Venom’s still out there doing who-know’s-what. I go to school, I won’t be able to pay attention, and I’ll probably have to ditch in the middle of the day anyway. I can make up one day of coursework, no problem.”

“I’m pretty sure you could teach a few classes at school if you wanted,” Gwen says with a smirk, and I shrug.

“I did once seriously think about being a teacher as like a career,” I say, swaying a bit with her in my arms, just enjoying her closeness. “But teachers get shit on these days.”

“True,” Gwen says with a pout. “If it’s not helicopter parents it’s government regulations and stuff.”

“I think I’ll just stick with being an inventor and Spider-Man,” I say, and Gwen snickers.

“I love that,” she says. “Like…you’re not only one of the most innovative inventor-types I know, it’s just, ‘By the way, I’m also a superhero, totes whatev.’”

“If I ever actually say ‘totes whatev’ sincerely, I want you to hit me,” I say, and she giggles.

“I think I can do that,” she says. “Okay, I’m gonna nom some breakfast, and then we can suit up and go patrol.”

“You’re coming with?” I ask, and Gwen rolls her eyes.

“You think I’d have any more luck paying attention in classes than you would?” she asks. “With you running around fighting some creepy space-monster? No, I’m coming with you to make sure you don’t get yourself killed. I’m pretty sure Mary Jane’s gonna come along, and Harry. And…well, all of us.”

“When did I inspire such loyal helpers?” I ask, and Gwen shakes her head.

“We’ve had this discussion,” she says. “You’re such a goody-goody dork that you inspire others to just do their best. It’s cute.”

“I’m not sure you can call me a goody-goody dork and then say it’s cute,” I say. She just snorts.

“I’m sorry, but goody-goody dork just equals cute,” she says. “Simple math.”

“I must have missed that lesson,” I say, and she nods.

“I probably forgot to give you the notes,” she says with mock regret. “I’m so sorry.”

“You better be,” I say, shaking my head gravely. “This is important life stuff I need to know.”

She giggles, kissing me softly again, murmuring into the contact before pulling away and planting one more little kiss on me.

“I love you,” she whispers. “I love you, and we’re gonna get through this, and we’re gonna just spend a whole week being normal human teenagers that aren’t out to save the world, okay?”

“I don’t know about that last bit, but a couple days at the very least,” I say. “Maybe just…sleeping.”

“Two-day nap?” she giggles. “I can get behind that.”

I lean in and rest my forehead against hers, soaking in the sight of her silvery blue eyes, her warm, loving smile, the way she seems able to look right through me, straight into my head. Riley and I may share a most of a brain, but Gwen can read that brain like a user manual.

“I love you, too,” I say, and she smiles sweetly at me.

“Did you eat breakfast?” she asks, and I nod.

“I asked Walton to go get a giant bag of Burger King,” I say. “There’s a few croissan’wiches left, still mostly warm.”

“Awesome,” she says happily, skipping off to the kitchen. “Once everyone’s up and dressed, you can send Harry and MJ to Oscorp, right?”

“We should go with them,” I say. “I think I might have made some real progress on like a symbiote life-sign finder or something my goggles.”

“For real?” Gwen asks, and I nod.

“Dr. Connors did all kinds of tests and stuff on it, trying to find out what makes it tick, and he found what are probably vitals, but he just has no idea how to like measure them or anything,” I tell her. “But it does give us something to look for. Venom puts out these weird electromagnetic waves. Connors thinks it’s how it syncs up with its host’s mind.”

“Pete, that’s awesome,” she says in awe. “You’ll have him in no time.”

“I can only hope so,” I mutter. “I feel like…antsy. Like something’s about to drop, and we’re too far away to catch it or something.”

She pouts, nodding. “You, too?” she ponders. “MJ was telling me this morning she had this…weird dream last night. You were fighting Venom, but it was…huge. Like…Veronica huge.”

“I thought she got a little wigged out in the middle of the night,” I say as the memory comes back to me. “She like grabbed on and wouldn’t let go.”

“She loves you,” Gwen says with a smile. “We all do.”

“Most guys are lucky to get one girlfriend,” I say. “I hit the jackpot.”

“Face it, Tiger,” a drowsy voice says, and MJ strolls in wearing her little sleep shorts and tank top. She stretches, arching her back (no bra) and lets a little squeak before trotting lazily over to slump into me, kissing me soundly. “Morning.”

“Morning,” I say back, and she smiles sweetly, kissing my neck.

“I brushed my teeth just so I could kiss you without morning breath, and now I’m gonna go shower,” she says, squeezing me. “You’re awesome, and we’re gonna kick ass today, okay?”

“I think that about covers everything,” I chuckle, and she giggles, gently pinching my cheek.

“Dork,” she says matter-of-factly, turning and skipping away.

“Alright, I’m gonna go get ready so we’re out of here as soon as possible,” Gwen says, taking my hand in both of hers and giving it a squeeze. “You alright?”

“I’ll be better when this is done,” I say, and she gives me a wan little smile, heading after Mary Jane and leaving me staring out over the city. If the internet is to be believed, Venom is still lurking around the city, terrorizing people and generally scaring the pants off of citizens, but he hasn’t been connected to any injuries or fatalities. Sketchy pictures show the bear beast still has the red growth on its back, so he hasn’t “given birth” yet, but our window of opportunity is closing at a rate we can’t determine.

We need to catch this thing. It’s caused too much strife to let free.

We will catch this thing.

……

After insisting to Professor X that they really felt they needed to be in New York to help with the hunt, Kitty, Flash, Bobby, and Jess were allowed to remain for one more day, so the Neighborhood Watch is at full capacity, with Riley joining us now that Cindy Moon and her Spider-Pack are back in school for the week.

I really need to deal with that soon enough, but I kind of have enough on my plate. Sometimes I wish life was a bit more like a TV show or a comic book, with cut-and-dry arcs, nothing overlapping or meshing together as they’re wont to do. I guess it’s more like a video game, but instead of taking missions, they’re all just dumped on me without really giving me any say, until I open my logbook and see 37 active quests all in various stages of completion.

At least I haven’t had to go trekking through a cave to fight a bandit leader.

Yet.

Sidetracked.

“So, I’m thinking we need a vehicle,” Harry says as I deposit Kitty in the small alley behind Oscorp. I dig around in my backpack and slide into some jeans and a coat, stepping into some shoes. Around me, everyone quickly slips into their own “secret identities” before we head for the front of the building. “I mean, we’re doing a hell of a lot of running and swinging and jumping, and it’s fun, but it gets old.”

“Harry Osborn is tired of his hoverboard already?” I ask, and Harry rolls his eyes at me.

“Dude, I could spend all day tearing up New York on this thing,” he says, tapping the control unit on his wrist, which sends the board flying up into the sky. For lack of a better option, I just made it so the hoverboard is extremely difficult for other people to happen on while Harry isn’t using it, as any sort of folding compact function is going to take months to fine-tune. “But sick freestyle hoverboard crime-fighting is way different than…like, the buddy system trip to Dad’s office.”

“Fair point,” I say as we step inside the small back entrance of the building, along with MJ. The others are just going to wait in the lobby while I escort my best friend and his ex-girlfriend who happens to be one of three girls who are currently calling themselves my girlfriends.

I think I may have been subconsciously refusing to acknowledge how awkward this elevator ride has the potential to be.

“I’m just saying, we totes need a Spider-Mobile,” Harry says as we step into the small rear elevator, so as not to attract undue attention from the bustling lobby-goers. “Like, the X-Men have a jet, we should at least have a flying car.”

Maybe not as awkward as I thought.

“Did you just use the word ‘totes’ unironically?” I ask, leaning against the side of the lift as it ascends.

“Picked it up from Jujube,” Harry admits. “She loves that word; it drives me nuts.”

“That’s actually adorable,” MJ says with a small laugh, and Harry shrugs.

“She’s pretty great,” he says, grinning. “She’s loving New York, and she really likes you guys.”

“I’m glad she’s settling in well,” I say. “I actually thought she might think we were just a bunch of goody-goody nerds.”

“Well, you know, she does,” Harry chuckles as the elevator drops us off at the sixty-second floor. “But she likes goody-goody nerds, so it’s awesome.”

I’m surprised when we step out of the elevator and hear Fall Out Boy’s Immortals playing at full blast. Connors has been manning the R&D lab in Tony’s absence, but in the rare event he even sets foot on the floor, he’s always listened to the classics, Tim Buckley being one of his favorites. The thought of him listening to anything made in the past two decades is…jarring.

“The fuck is this?” Harry asks, following closely behind me as I make my way down the cubicle hall to the main work area. I can hear people talking, but the words are lost in the loud music and slight echo the room has. “Is Tony back?”

I could only hope so; it would be so nice to find Tony and just get help. All the help. Maybe an army of Veronicas. But it’s not Tony Stark that approaches us as we emerge into the room proper.

It’s…a rather tall, lanky twenty-something guy with straw-blonde hair tucked into a green beanie and an easy smile on his face. He spends a second taking in the sight of us, looking bemused.

“Hey, what’s up?” he asks in a friendly voice, his eyes landing on Harry. “Yo, it’s the boss’s kid! Um…Jerry? No, wait….”

“It’s – “

“No, I wanna guess it!” he says. “Mary! No, wait, that’s a girl’s name, sorry.”

“Harry,” Harry finally says, and the guy blinks blearily.

“Dude, like Harry Potter!” he says, and I groan as Harry stiffens at my side.

That was all he heard in middle school, to the point that his perpetually messy hair even earned him the nickname “Potter” and later “Dan”, after Daniel Radcliffe.

It’s something of a sore point for him.

“Who are you guys?” I ask before Harry can deck this weird man, and from the annoyed look on his face, he’s about one more stupid remark from doing so.

“Oh! Yeah, I’m Fred,” he says, gesturing over his shoulder. “We’re here to help Tadashi.”

“And who’s – “

“That’s me,” a new voice says, and behind Fred, I see a rather tall man of obvious Asian descent making his way toward us. “Fred, stop confusing our guests and go help Aiko with that new mixture.”

“You got it, el Capitan,” Fred says with a left-handed salute, trotting down the hall and leaving us with the man apparently known as Tadashi. He’s a bit taller than Tony, with close-cropped black hair, dark brown eyes, and a friendly smile that’s instantly endearing.

“Sorry about Fred,” he says with a smile, turning to us. “We roomed together in college, and he pulled me out of a few tight spots over the years. He’s about the only reason I made it to graduation alive. So I guess I feel like I owe him a steady job, at least.”

“He smells like pot and dirty laundry,” MJ says distastefully.

“Yeah, you’ll get that,” Tadashi says with a blasé shrug. “Anway, you’re Harry Osborn, and you…must be Peter Parker. I’ve heard a lot about you.”

“Have you?” I ask, and he nods.

“You managed to impress Mr. Stark, at least,” Tadashi says. “That’s pretty amazing itself, but you also snagged a pretty sweet contract for Oscorp with the Wakanda deal, and it’s thanks to that that I even have a job. So on behalf of me, the team, and my little brother, thank you.”

“Um…you’re welcome,” I say, and Tadashi grins at me.

“So, I’m Tadashi, if you haven’t guessed, and one more thing Mr. Stark said was if you ever showed up, we were to give you the lab, not ask any questions, and just go about our work,” he says with an amused look, patting me on the shoulder. “So you do your thing, pal.”

With that, he turns and strolls off, leaving the three of us to look bemusedly at each other. I just shrug and withdraw Baymax’s remote interface from my pocket. While the core is kept safely at the penthouse or back home, I have several “escape hatches” for him to quickly transfer himself to other devices in safer places if either of those were ever compromised, and I have an interface that allows for easier access to a computer system that he would otherwise have to spend a few moments cracking open.

This is the device I plug into the computer that once housed Jarvis, but Tony uprooted the entire AI and took him with him on whatever adventure he scuttled off to overseas, leaving a lovely system for Baymax to settle into and override.

“Baymax,” I say. “Hunting protocol.”

“Understood,” Baymax says. “Symbiote detection software is also—ready for use.”

“Alright, let’s try not to advertise that to these people,” I say, turning to Harry and MJ. “Suit up.”

They hurry off, and I tap at the holodisplay for a moment, unaware of someone approaching behind me until I hear a voice over my shoulder.

“Um…excuse me,” a quiet voice says, and I turn to see a man of…maybe thirty years old, though he has one of those faces that could be anywhere from his late twenties to his mid-fifties. He has a pale complexion and dark, curly hair, with the beginnings of a stubble dusting his cheeks. He’s average of height and somewhat stocky without being thick, like he worked out at one time but stopped very recently.

“…Hi,” I say, looking dubiously at him.

“Are you Peter Parker?” the man asks, and I just nod, internally wondering if I’m going to start becoming as well-known as Peter Parker as I am as Spider-Man.

That would just be inconvenient in a number of ways.

“I’m Bruce,” the man says. “Bruce Banner. Tony…. Um, Tony Stark? He said you could help me.”

“With what?” I ask, not unkindly, because helping people is kind of my thing right now.

“I…I’m trying to find a friend of mine,” he says. “His name is Tim Dugan. Tony told me you might be able to find him if – “

“Urgent news report,” Baymax says, and on the holographic display, several screens show up, all showing an enormous green man snarling and ripping apart buildings, tossing cars, and generally ripping apart what looks like some random intersection in Brooklyn. “The—Hulk—has been sighted in—Manhattan. State of emergency declared.”

“That…is that happening right now?” Bruce Banner asks, staring in shock at the screens. “That’s going on right now?”

“Looks like it,” I point out, a sense of dread welling up from the pit of my stomach. “Baymax, talk to me.”

“Triangulating location,” Baymax says, and I reach into my backpack, pulling on my mask. I’d love to have the luxury of being able to worry about keeping my secret identity, well…secret, but there are apparently much bigger fish to fry.

Like the Hulk.

How am I supposed to fry the Hulk?

How am I supposed to stand in the presence of the Hulk with voiding my bowels?

This is a very real and imminent concern.

I’m shaking.

“You…you’re…” Bruce Banner is staring at me in bewilderment as I shrug out of my civilian clothes, leaving only Spider-Man standing in front of the console.

“Baymax,” I say into my voice modulator. “Track the Hulk, keep an eye out for Venom. Did Tony leave the Iron Legion behind?”

“Scanning,” Baymax says. “Iron Legion located.”

“Mobilize,” I say. “Evacuation protocol; keep as much space clear around the Hulk as you can. If they find Venom, head him off. If they find the Hulk, do not engage. Harry?”

“Pete, dude, there’s some shit going down – “

“Stay on the roof, we’ll be up a minute,” I tell him. “Don’t wander off. Baymax, get me Gwen.”

“Pete!?” Gwen asks as soon as the line connects. “Pete, on the news…is that actually – “

“It is,” I sigh, and Gwen is silent for a moment before letting a sigh of her own.

“We’re gonna fight him,” she says, her tone not even a question, just nervous and resigned.

“Yeah,” I say, making for the elevator. “Meet up on the roof. Then we’re fighting the Hulk.”

……

As we make our way towards Brooklyn, the Burger King breakfast churning in my stomach like someone turned on a spin cycle, Bruce Banner fills me in on the dirty details of what led the Hulk to be rampaging around New York.

Years ago, in just one among hundreds of misguided attempts to recreate the Super-Soldier Serum that brought about Captain America, Dr. Banner devised a formula of his own. With no idea what was behind the “Vita-Rays” mentioned in numerous publications at the time, he settled on gamma radiation, which historically had a rather hit-and-miss success rate in producing powers in individuals.

“I’ll admit, it was thin reasoning, but I was under a lot of pressure from the military,” he says over the comm. “So I surrounded myself with yes-men and forged ahead.”

Out of seven test subjects, two died within seconds, two more in a matter of hours, one lasted a month, and another is still in a coma to this day.

The one still walking and talking…and smashing…is Timothy Dugan, affectionately referred to by his friends as Dum-Dum.

“He seemed fine, stronger than ever, and…well, it looked like we might actually have some results to work with,” Banner says. “The next day, though, his parents visited. His father was…not the easiest to get along with, and before long, the shouting started, and….”

“He Hulked out,” I finish for him, crawling along the side of a building with Kitty clutching tightly to my back before I leap us back into the air, swinging below a train track, Riley right on my tail.

“We’ve been keeping him under guard until we can figure out a way to reverse the process,” Banner says. “He’s been cooperative until now. But it’s…it’s his son’s third birthday, and he’d been asking to go visit. I told him it wouldn’t be a good move, but he broke perimeter this morning.”

“Do we know what made him go Hulk?” I ask.

“His wife called me earlier to tell me that he’d been by their apartment,” he said. “She didn’t exactly roll out the welcome wagon when he showed up.”

I swing up and land on an overpass, waiting for the rest of the Watch to gather around me. In the distance, I can hear the sounds of destruction, plumes of dust and smoke swirling into the sky just a few blocks away. Helicopters hover over the scene, and I hear police sirens, what sounds like hundreds of them. According to news reports, the military has been notified, and it’s only a matter of time before they get involved.

“What’s the plan?” Kitty asks, and I just shake my head.

“Right now, my plan is a sobbing panic attack,” I say. “Then I collect myself and then come up with a plan.”

“Can we skip right to step three?” Jess asks, placing a hand on my arm. “No pressure, of course.”

“Except kind of a little pressure,” Flash says, clapping me on the shoulder. “C’mon, Pete. Fear is just another wall. Climb it or bust through it, but if you lean against it, it starts to get awful comfy.”

“That’s borderline poetic,” Riley says, and Flash grins.

“Dad’s drill instructor loved that one,” he says. “C’mon, we’re nine plucky kids versus a giant monster thing. This is our Power Rangers moment!”

“I mean, we even have a megazord,” Mary Jane says, shifting to place her giant metal hands on her hips. “You asked what Veronica is meant to fight. I think this is it.”

“Aaaah, fuck it!” I say, psyching myself up. “Alright, Harry, Johnny, Kitty, you guys go with Riley and help civilians get out of there. There’s gonna be a lot of flying debris, so be careful. Kitty, stay with Riley so you can phase her in case something big comes flying.”

Kitty pouts a bit as she hops off my back, but she skips over to Riley and clings onto her instead.

“The rest of us are going to hold his attention,” I say. “Flash, unload everything you’ve got into him. MJ, if he looks like he’s trying to run off, give him a few punches, bring him back. Gwen, web him to anything you possibly can. Bobby, just like with Stegron, freeze him down. Jess, go for the eyes, try to blind him.”

“Blind him?” Jess asks. “Isn’t that kind of…extreme?”

“We don’t have a lot of room to be nice about this,” I say. “All we need to do is get him to de-Hulk. I don’t think we’ll need to kill him, but we can’t hold back. Okay?”

She nods, a grim expression setting her mouth. “Got it.”

“Neighborhood Watch,” I say, and Harry cackles.

“He’s gonna say it!”

“It’s a beautiful day in the neighborhood.”

“What a day!” Harry shouts. “What a lovely day!” He takes off with a gleeful whoop, Johnny and Riley right on his tail with Kitty clinging to Riley’s back.

“Ready?” Gwen asks, and I shake my head.

“Nope,” I say. “Let’s go.”

I leap from the building, swinging down through the streets. Below, traffic is gridlocked, and people are abandoning their cars, running as fast they can away from the scene. In the distance, I see the Iron Legion assisting them. Police and SWAT vehicles are herding them away, but their blared announcements are lost in the din of screams, sirens, and the Hulk’s guttural roars.

Then we swing around a corner and lay eyes on the man himself.

“Oh….” Jess says, but her voice dies, and she’s incapable of saying anything else.

Have you ever felt a fear so primal, so deeply ingrained, that everything from basic subconscious instinct all the way up to higher thinking is telling you that no, you really do have a damn good reason to be terrified? If not, take a good look at the Hulk, because that’ll do it. He’s much bigger in person than the admittedly grainy news reports would have you believe, a towering forty feet, at least, and every inch of him is powerful, corded green muscle, taut with fury. His face, though, is what really sets off the alarm bells, causing a near-constant but faint buzz of spider-sense. His features are twisted in the purest expression of unbridled rage I’ve ever seen, lips curled in a snarl, brow furrowed into a deep glare, and his wild eyes wide and manic.

And now he’s looking at me. Terrific.

“Graaah!” Hulk yells, hefting a city bus and hurling it at us. Thankfully, it’s empty, but it’s also flying at me with alarming speed. I leap under it and run at the Hulk, because I just wanna die, I guess.

Thankfully, I’m faster, though only by a bit, as I leap between his grabbing hand and land a solid kick on his jaw. Of course, he’s the freaking Hulk, so it does nothing more than cause me a small twinge of pain in my foot.

“Electro, your turn!”

I leap away just as a massive bolt of electricity fires down and scorches along the Hulk. He snarls, staggering just a bit, and Gwen takes that time to web his feet up.

“Timber!” MJ shouts, the ground rumbling as she runs in and lays a solid punch on the Hulk, causing him to tumble, straining briefly against Gwen’s webs and landing on his back.

“There’s no way it was that easy,” Jess says from my side, and we hear a ripping, tearing sound as Hulk’s leg muscles flex, seeming to grow a bit as he yanks Gwen’s webbing apart, clambering to his feet and staring around at us.

“Annoying puny bugs and metal man make Hulk angry!” he yells. “Hulk SMASH!”

“I bet you say that to everybody,” I tell him, hurrying forward and leaping, webbing off a building and swinging around him. He bats at me, and I can feel the gusts from his swiping hands as I swing around and land on his shoulder, webbing his arm to a nearby building. I leap away as he yanks at the webbing, but he’s paused long enough to get a face full of fire from Jess, snarling and clutching at his eyes.

“Leave Hulk ALONE!” he shouts, and Jess has enough time to zip out of the way before he punches at her with a meaty green fist. He’s way faster than someone his size should be able to move.

“Sorry, but your little temper tantrum is causing millions of taxpayer dollars in damage!” I say, nimbly leaping out of the way as he swats at me again. “So unless you have one hell of a trust fund sitting around somewhere, we’re gonna have a problem.”

Another arc of electricity collides with him, and he bellows out in rage, turning and grabbing a stoplight. He yanks it from the ground and hurls it at Flash, but thankfully, Flash has been practicing, dissolving into lightning and zapping away. His distraction is all MJ needs to charge forward and tackle him, wrapping her giant metal Veronica-arms around the Hulk and bodily lifting him to throw him into a building.

“Property damage!” I yell, swinging after them.

“The word ‘collateral’ mean anything to you!?” she shouts back. “Also, c’mon, no comment on how bad fucking ass that was?”

“HULK CRUSH YOU!”

“I think we’re just making him angrier,” Flash says, floating over as Bobby follows. “Every time we knock him down, he just – “

“Airborn!” MJ yells, and Veronica goes flying, spiraling through the air as the Hulk flings himself after her.

“Hulk stronger than metal man! HULK STRONGEST THERE IS!”

He lands atop Veronica, battering at the armor and ripping chunks off, tossing them away.

“Peter!?” she says over the comm, and my heart twists at the fear I hear in her voice.

“Shit, shit, shit,” I cuss, swinging over and firing a cluster of webs at Hulk’s hand, tying it down to a wall, but he rips a chunk right out of the building as he brings the fist down. Thankfully, the chunk of masonry flies right at him, colliding and distracting him long enough for Flash to zoom over and give him a good zap before zooming away. Hulk tears after him, and I land on the armor, running across the chest.

“Baymax, open up Veronica,” I say quickly, and a soft pneumatic hiss sounds as the chest of the armor opens up, revealing MJ looking dazed but otherwise okay as she crawls out. I pull her into a hug, squeezing her tightly. “You alright, you hurt?”

“I’m fine, Tiger,” she says, giggling and lifting my mask before placing a soft kiss on my lips, grunting as she crawls to her feet. “Did we bring the Jackpot armor?”

“No,” I say, pulling mask over my face as I speak. “You’re sitting this one out. You did good, but this is…I don’t know how we’re gonna do this.”

“With help, of course,” a new voice says, and we look up to see a woman standing nearby, looking up at us with the slightest quirk of a smile to her lips. “Spider-Man.”

She’s average of height and has a slight but athletic build similar to MJ’s. She’s wearing skintight black pants and a black tunic with a strange sort of chest armor that’s just six small plates arranged in two rows of three down her front. A flowing red cape billows out behind her, and silver helmet hides her eyes, long blonde locks spilling out from it and down her shoulders and back.

“Tony sends his regards,” she says. “He also says if you broke any of his stuff, he’s taking it out of your paycheck.”

“Tell him, ‘fuck you, I miss you, too’,” I say, and she smirks.

“I like you already,” she says, swinging her hammer in her hand and launching herself forward at the Hulk. She collides and sends the Jerky Green Giant flying. He lands and rolls, spinning to his feet and bellowing with rage at the new arrival.

“Hulk crush small woman – “

His threat is cut off by a swift smack to the chin by the woman’s hammer, which sends him several feet in the air before he lands again.

“Mister Dugan, you need to calm down,” she says.

“Puny Dugan is weak!” the Hulk yells. “Hulk is strong – “

“You’re like a broken record,” the woman says with another slam of her hammer.

“Pete?” Harry’s voice comes over the comm. “We might have a problem. Actually, no, we totally have a problem.”

“Venom’s back, and he’s moving toward the Hulk,” I guess.

“How did you know?” he asks.

“Because that’s the worst possible thing that could happen, and let’s face it, we’re on a streak right now,” I say, grabbing MJ and slinging her onto my back before leaping onto a building and climbing up the side. We’re joined by the rest of the Hulk group, as Miss Hammer seems to have things handled, trading blows with the Hulk like she’s not a sixteenth of his size.

“What’s going on?” Jess asks as I lower MJ to the rooftop and sigh, rubbing my temples.

“We found Venom,” I say with sarcastic joy.

“Oh, fuck,” she says, shaking her head. “Now?”

“Yes, now,” I say, sliding my hands down to hang at my sides. “Alright. Alright, Bobby, can you take MJ to safety? She’s gonna sit this one out.”

“Pete, I can do it – “

“The only thing I want you to do is go back to base and stay okay,” I tell her. “For me.”

She huffs at that, rolling her eyes and nodding. “You had to put it that way,” she grumbles. “Alright, but next time I’m kicking butt right next to you.”

“Well, duh,” say, and she smiles, backing up and letting Bobby lift her up. He glances up at me, and I stare back. “Watch over her.”

“Can do, Boss,” he says with a grin, icing away.

“Busy day, hm?” Gwen asks, and I let a single snort.

“And it’s not even noon yet.”

……

This felt like a western to Kitty. Pistols at noon? Wasn’t that the old trope? She could almost hear the dramatic music, punctuated by still silence as Harry Osborn stared down the Venom-bear that had apparently given them so much trouble the other night.

Standing directly behind Riley, who was sweet enough to hold an arm protectively in front of her, she watched as Harry, wearing what was apparently called the Soundwave armor, contacted Peter before turning to them.

“Stay back,” he said.

“Now, what are the odds of me actually doing that?” Riley said, stepping forward with Kitty in tow. “We’re in this together, Harry. I’m not Peter Parker, but I’m still….”

“Still my best bud,” he says, a smile in his voice. “Alright, what’s the call?”

“Well, you have the sound armor, so…get in there, champ,” Riley said. “But I’m right behind you. Johnny, same as before, cover Venom if he tries to get away.”

“Can do,” Johnny said, swooping around the scene.

“Kitty…if he gets near you, get real dense and give him a good smack, okay?” Riley said, turning to her, and Kitty smiled, glad she wasn’t being relegated to staying out of trouble, as things usually went during fights she was involved in.

Just because she could become intangible (and thus pretty much unable to be hurt) didn’t mean she wanted to sit every fight out. Peter wearing her as a backpack and borrowing her powers was great because she could be helpful to him. If she was off cowering in a corner, she might as well not even be there at all.

“I can do that,” she told Riley, watching as Harry leapt toward the symbiote-infested bear, sending out a rumbling pulse of sound that sent ripples along the symbiote itself, causing a disturbing amount of black tendrils to shoot out and attempt to escape the noise. The bear snarled, leaping at Harry, who simply batted it away, holding his hands out and sending another pulsing soundwave at it.

Kreeng-WHOOM!

“Venom!” Harry shouted. “I name thee my foe!”

“He always did have a flair for the theatric,” Riley said fondly, and Kitty just shook her head.

“Don’t go falling in love with him now,” she said as they watched, ready to get involved if things showed any sign of tipping in Venom’s favor. Riley just turned to Kitty, and though Kitty couldn’t see her expression behind her mask, every inch of Riley’s stance indicated the absolute height of sass.

“I won’t even dignify that with a sincere response,” was all she said.

“Aw, you’re too cute sometimes,” Kitty said, giggling as Riley just shook her head. She’d been informed rather recently of the fact that Riley was in fact a clone of Peter Parker, only something got mixed up along the way to make her turn out as a girl instead of a boy. Strangely, she also carried all of Peter Parker’s memories, which was not how cloning usually worked, but there was simply no way of figuring out how such a thing had happened, so they were just rolling with it.

Kitty, of course, had had about a million questions for what amounted to a boy in a girl’s body, but once the novelty had worn off, she’d realized what a predicament Riley was in, having to basically fabricate a new life all her own after the one she’d previously been living had turned out to not be hers anymore.

That was about the point that Kitty had realized that this was probably not a whole lot of fun at all for Riley herself.

She sympathized, as much as she was able to at least, but in the end, there was no way to truly put herself in Riley’s shoes. At the very least, she was happy to listen to Riley’s gripes, even if she was just a way for the poor girl to vent. She had once considered that Riley was essentially her crush in a different body, but no amount of internal reflection could make Kitty change her sexual preference. She liked boys, and that was that.

She did make it a point to ask around at the X-Mansion if any of her female classmates were into girls, but the only ones that were didn’t seem a good match for Riley. Emma Frost had sure seemed interested, but she was way too intense for a girl like Riley.

Riley needed someone a bit more laid-back, someone she could relax around.

Kreeng-WHOOM!

“Guys, it’s doing something!” Harry shouted, and Kitty snapped from her thoughts to see the Venom-bear rearing up on its hind legs, snarling at them and lashing out at Harry with a spidery limb before snarling, the twitching red mass on its back pulsating before splitting open.

“Oh, gross, it’s going into labor,” Kitty said as red goo spilled onto the rooftop, but what she thought was amniotic fluid began to thicken and coalesce, growing a massive gaping jaw and eight glowing blue eyes before snarling at them.

“Get clear!” Harry said, and Kitty was unceremoniously slung over Riley’s back, having only a second to cling on tightly and alter her density a bit so she didn’t have to contend with her own weight while holding on. Nearby, Johnny was winging away as well.

“Baymax,” Kitty barely heard Harry say. “Drop the bass.”

Kreeeeeeeng-WHUMP-WUUUB!

They landed on a rooftop just in time for Peter and his crew to arrive.

“Firestar, light ‘em up!” Pete said, and Jess arced over to the fight, two massive flames forming in her hands.

“Welcome to the barbecue!” she said, firing toward the symbiote.

“Baymax, are the symbiote containment units intact?” Peter asked, listening to his response before swearing. “Damn it! We need to get back to Veronica. They’re in one piece, but there’s not enough power to deploy them. We’ll need to get them out manually.”

“Um, did you forget that the Hulk is kinda rampaging back there?” Flash asked, floating nearby with his skin still that shimmering blue.

“That Thor woman has him occupied,” Pete said, already turning and heading back the way they came, Riley following after him. “If we can get the containment units out of the suit, they’ll have enough ancillary power to take it from there, but Veronica landed on her back, so we have to flip her, get those things out, and activate them. Harry, can you keep those things contained?”

……

“The red one is going nucking futs, man,” Harry said, dodging as Venom’s little tumor-baby lunged at him before screeching away when Jess shot a ball of flame at it. Venom-bear snarled and leapt at Jess, who dodged and spun in a fiery kick that sent it shrinking away. “I don’t think it likes not having something to glom onto.”

“Keep them busy and do not let them out of your sight,” Pete said. “Johnny?”

“Already on eye-in-the-sky shield duty,” Johnny told them. “Got you covered, Harry.”

Harry felt better knowing the symbiotes weren’t getting away. They had sound and fire, the two things symbiotes hated the most, meaning they weren’t about to get glommed anytime soon, and a whole lot of personal time with these things. The first time he’d met Venom, he’d been a puppet. The second time, he’d been the fumbling hunter giving chase.

Now, he was the motherfucking boss.

Kreeng-WHOOM!

“Come at me, Fuzzy-Wuzzy!” he yelled as Venom-bear lunged at him with a meaty paw, ducking under it and shoving his hands into the beast’s stomach.

Kreeng-WHOOMPH!

The bear flew backward with a snarl, slamming into a purple-blue barrier and falling back to the rooftop. With a decidedly un-bearlike roar, its maw opened, revealing rows of fangs and that familiar lashing tongue.

“Ngraaagh!” it bellowed, charging for Harry, but he just held his hands out again.

Kreeng-BUPH!

“Gah, fuck!” Harry said as the symbiote latched onto his repulsor gloves, surrounding them with its ooze before they could go off. It was obviously not comfortable for the beast, but it muffled the sound enough that it didn’t shrink away, slamming into Harry and carrying him over the edge of the building. “Shit, Johnny, the bear’s on the ground!”

“I see,” Johnny said, flying in and hovering overhead. “I think I can keep track of both of you guys, but don’t let them spread much further apart. Pete, how’s the containment thingie going?”

……

“Working on it!” I shout as Riley, Gwen, and I grab a hold of the Veronica armor and heave, flipping it over with a groaning creak of its metal limbs. It flops heavily onto its chest, and I climb hurriedly onto the back.

“Baymax, we need those containment units about five minutes ago,” I say, and the back hatch opens with a tired whir, the armor’s juice nearly depleted with most of its arc reactors having been ripped away by the Hulk. Still, the containment units are self-sustaining, so once they’re activated, all we have to do is get Venom separated from the bear and lure its bouncing baby into the other one.

Should be easy.

It won’t be easy.

The two containment units unfold from Veronica, looking like large metal spheres about five feet in diameter. Four thick metal legs extend from each them, scuttling forward as a hatch opens on the fronts.

“Units—prepared for—containment procedures,” Baymax says, and I leap on top of one of them, glancing around. Down the street, through the haze of dust and debris floating in the air, I can see Lady Thor smacking around the Hulk, who is growing increasingly agitated and thus more dangerous. Even after we handle the symbiotes, we still have that to contend with.

This is like the ending to a Final Fantasy game. Bosses after bosses after bosses.

“Harry, can you guys lure them to my location?” I ask, marking my spot on his HUD.

“Uh, right now, we’re just kinda keeping them from getting out of sight—shit,” he grumbles. “Pete, the red one’s on the move, Jess can’t get a—agh!”

“Harry!?” I call, leaping onto a wall and crawling up to clamber onto a rooftop, the others behind me. “Status, what’s up!?”

“The bear got me,” he says. “I’m good, but he’s…oh, fuck, fuck! GET OVER HERE, IT’S GOING FOR THE HULK!”

That is pretty much the worst possible thing.

“On me!” I shout, running and leaping from rooftop to rooftop, closing the distance between the battle, hearing the sounds of the Hulk’s shouting growing louder. I can just make out twin red and black blurs making their way down toward the fight, and I almost trip over the discarded form of a skeletally-thin bear, which growls feebly as we leap by.

“Oh, no…” Gwen breathes as Hulk pauses mid swing to snarl in confusion as blackness engulfs his foot.

“Get off of Hulk!” he yells shaking his foot, but the symbiote just spreads higher, and I glance wildly around.

“Harry, we could really use a bass-drop right now!”

“I can barely move,” Harry says. “That fucker got my arc reactor. The armor’s shot to shit.”

“Damn it!” I growl out, turning to the others. “Stay here, I’m gonna see if Thor has a plan.”

I leap from the rooftop and swing down, landing near Lady Thor, who is staring in horror as the symbiote wraps over Hulk’s head, leaving him with eight glowing green eyes, rows of razor-sharp white teeth that are visible as he snarls at us, and even more muscle, if possible, so that he looks like one of those guys on the cover of bodybuilding magazines, only scaled up and pitch black.

“We! Am! HULK!”

“This just got very complicated,” Lady Thor says, and I snort.

“Yeah, no kidding,” I say, not liking the way my voice tremors, even through the modulator. “Plan?”

“Same as before,” she says, “only I don’t hold back anymore.”

“I like that plan,” I say, and she grins at me, swinging her hammer and flying straight at Venom-Hulk, a massive bolt of lightning shooting from her hammer. It collides with the monstrosity, sending it staggering back a step, but faster than I can follow, he bats her away with a roar, sending her spiraling through a building.

“Damn it!” I swear, hurrying across the street to clamber into the hole in the wall, finding her slowly getting to her feet. “You alright?”

“Pete, what’s going on down there?” Gwen asks in my ear. “Do we need to get involved?”

“Find the red one,” I say back, steadying Thor as she stands. “Get the containment units moving. Riley, see if you can – “

“Salvaging an arc reactor from Veronica to splice into the Soundwave armor,” Riley says. “We’re trying, but we need time.”

“Pete, we can’t find the red one anywhere,” Gwen says. “We’ve spread out, we’re searching, but – “

“Watch it!” Thor says, and I’m shoved out of the way as I hear a muted snarling sound followed by a grunt from her. “Agh! What is this – “

“No…no, fuck!” I say, musing for a moment that I have been doing a lot of cussing in the past couple hours, but as I watch the new red symbiote slowly crawling up Thor’s leg, I think that I might have earned a few coins in the swear jar. Lady Thor’s eyes shoot up to meet mine, going wide with fear, but I also see determination in the set of her face. She rears a hand back and gives me a solid punch, sending me flying out of the building. She obviously held back, though, as I feel only the barest twinge, and by the time I skid to a landing, the pain has faded.

“It’s on you now!” she shouts, staggering from the building herself, groaning with the exertion of fighting off the symbiote, but it’s a losing battle, as redness is slowly engulfing her, outfit and all. To my left, the Venom-Hulk is lumbering toward me, snarling.

“Hulk crush puny Spider-Man,” he growls.

I look back and see Lady Thor straining, raising the hammer.

Whosoever holds this hammer….

She hurls it at me. In my head, I hear a whisper, like thoughts that aren’t quite mine.

If he be worthy….

My eyes track the hammer as it flies at me, my hand extending seemingly of its own accord.

Shall possess the power of Thor….

My hand wraps around the handle, and instantly, I feel a rush of power coursing through me, like I just shotgunned two Red Bulls but without the heart palpitations. Lightning flashes around me, and the power intensifies, warming me from the inside. I feel like I could fight anything and crush it. Venom-Hulk charges, and I leap, spinning in the air and swinging the hammer to connect with his chin, sending it careening back, through the air and into a building. I land, watching as the monstrosity staggers to his feet.

“Holy shit, Pete,” Gwen says, and I turn to see her standing next to me.

“Let’s have the ‘holy shit’ moment later,” I say, blinking when I realize my voice modulator is gone. I reach up to feel my mask, but instead, my fingers find cold metal. I’m wearing a helmet? Looking down, I see that I’m wearing armor similar to Lady Thor’s, down to the flowing red cape. Does the Thor outfit come with the hammer?

Whatever.

“I need you guys to handle the red one,” I say, gesturing at Red as it snarls, finished assimilating Lady Thor and charging at us. “I’ll take the big guy.”

“Pete, you can’t take that thing on by yourself,” she says, and I shake my head.

“I can hold him off until you guys get the red one away from her,” I say, turning and smacking Red away with the hammer.

This thing is awesome.

“Trust me,” I tell her. “Go.”

She huffs but nods. Behind her, Jess lands and hurls a fireball at Red. Meanwhile, I round on Venom-Hulk, who is snarling as he recovers himself.

“Voice…in Hulk’s head,” he snarls, roaring at me. “Get out of Hulk’s head!”

He charges, and as he moves, I can almost sense the gamma radiation thick around him, tainted by the cloud of faint energy given off by the symbiote. I try that trick Lady Thor did, swirling the leather strap of the hammer in my hand. I’m surprised at how easy it is to do so and fling it forward, carrying me at the Venom-Hulk with lightning speed.

Speaking of lightning.

The hammer’s head crackles, glowing blue before I collide, and when I contact the massive black beast, a burst of lightning surges forth, zapping the symbiote-infested Hulk and causing it to yell out in rage as it slides backward on its feet.

“Get out of Hulk’s head!” he roars again, and I nimbly dodge as he swats at me, bellowing and clutching his skull. “Puny Peter Parker get out of Hulk’s head!”

“What?” I gasp. “How did you – “

Ow.

The mention of my name caused me to pause long enough for him to get a solid backhand on me, sending me flying through two cars, a UPS truck, and a brick wall. If it wasn’t for my spider-induced durability, likely compounded by whatever powers the hammer gave to me, I’d be a very tasteless paint job on the hood and windshield of a Lexus.

“I was asking you a question, Mr. Dugan,” I say, staggering to my feet, and he snarls at me.

“Puny Dugan is not here!” he yells. “We are Hulk!”

“Dugan, Hulk, Venom, whoever you’re deciding to call yourself, you’re about to see what it’s like to get smashed!” I say, charging him and rearing the hammer back. I’ve never fought using a weapon in my life, but the hammer feels perfectly balanced in my hand, and as the Venom-Hulk rears a giant black fist back to sock at me, I know just how to move, how to shift my weight to swing the hammer right at his hand.

Ker-THUNG!

He flies back and lands against a building, crawling along it before leaping at me.

“Aw, he wants a hug?” I ask, spinning the hammer and flying at him, colliding with his chest and knocking him off course, calling another blast of lightning down to zap him good. I land against a wall, clinging to it and hanging off with one hand, the other still clutching the hammer. “Or maybe some way to calm down? I know lots of people listen to those ‘soothing sounds’ CDs. They make all kinds. Tranquil forests, beachside…thunderstorms.”

I leap at Venom-Hulk, and he roars, reaching out to snag me in the air, but just as he wraps his hand around me, I raise the hammer.

“Boom!” I yell as a thunderclap sounds from the head, sending writhing tendrils curling away from the hand holding me, and I’m dropped as another roar sounds in Hulk’s throat.

“Ngrah! Hulk is not…scared of noise!” he yells. “Hulk not scared of anything!”

“That thing on you sure doesn’t like it,” I tell him, spinning the hammer. “Hm, maybe you need to confront your fears? Let’s see.”

I thrust the hammer in front of me, sending out another thunderclap, and the symbiote ripples, a tendril shooting out at me, piercing the pavement in front of me as I leap out of the way, spinning the hammer and taking off into the sky. It’s amazing; it feels like I’ve been using this thing my entire life, like every time I need to do something, I just know how.

“I have had it!” I yell as I fall, the hammering glowing blue and trailing a bolt of lightning toward the infested Hulk. “I’ve had it! With! You!” I slam down with a massive lightning bolt. “I’ve had it with that black THING!” I crush him with another thunderclap. “And I have had it with all of this SHIT! Going on all at the SAME! TIME!”

The buildings around me are rumbling, windows breaking as I collide with the Hulked out Venom beast, hitting him with several powerful thunderclaps. The symbiote snarls and shrinks away, causing the Hulk to hesitate.

“Agh, Hulk is not scared of puny human!” he says, snarling and scrabbling at his arms and chest, yanking at the goo. “Get scaredy black thing off!”

“Glad to help with that,” Jess’s voice says, and she lands next to me, launching a fireball at the Hulk, which collides and sends the symbiote shrinking even further away, the Hulk snarling and pulling at it. “We contained the red one.”

“Good,” I say, gripping the hammer. “Get the other containment unit, but don’t get it too close to Hulk. I’m gonna hit him with some thunder, and I want you to keep your distance and fire him up. As soon as that thing is off of him, I want Johnny to trap it and get it to containment.”

“Yes, sir, Mister Thor, sir,” she says, and I roll my eyes, spinning the hammer.

“Be ready,” I say, flinging myself toward the Hulk. Another thunderclap sounds as I bring the hammer down on his head, the symbiote shrinking away from the intense soundwaves.

“You listen to much AC/DC, Dugan?” I ask, hopping behind the Hulk and smacking him in the back with another thunderous strike. “I got a buddy that loves them. One of his favorite songs by them is this song called Thunderstruck. The lyrics are a little weird, didn’t make much sense to me until today.”

WHOOM!

“But apparently, in extenuating circumstances, you really can strike someone with thunder!” I say gleefully. The symbiote shrinks away, and Jess pelts it with fire, causing Hulk to yell and snarl, but the black goop is slowly seeping away from him, unable to coalesce enough to reform around him.

“Give him everything we’ve got!” I call. “Don’t let up!”

“Git sooooome!” Harry yells, and the Soundwave armor flies in, careening overhead. “Got your back, Pete! Let’s fuck him up!”

Kreeng-WHOOM!

Hulk thrashes at Harry, but every time he gets near, a barrier comes up and stops him, Johnny circling overhead, just out of reach. His mask his torn, revealing some of the strain on his face, but he’s holding together.

“He’s on the ropes!” I shout, spinning and cracking Hulk across the knees, tripping him up and knocking his feet out from under him. The symbiote is slowly seeping away, oozing across the pavement like a demented rippling wave. “Johnny!”

“Got it!” Johnny says, swooping in, and a thick, nearly opaque bubble appears around the symbiote. “Handle the Hulk, I got this!”

The Hulk is snarling, getting back to his feet, but he looks weary from struggling against the symbiote. This may be our only shot. Spinning the hammer again, I set myself and leap, aiming straight for his head.

Ker-THOOM!

He staggers, swaying like a drunken man before he finally tumbles backward, groaning and falling onto his back. The others gather around him, but I make sure to check on the containment units. One is blinking with a red light, showing that the symbiote is securely trapped inside, and the other is flashing yellow as the locks are put into place while Johnny watches. Soon, that one is blinking red as well, and I sigh with relief.

They’re neutralized for the moment.

I head back over to check on the Hulk to see that he’s shrinking down, his skin fading to a more normal fleshy tone, his hair fading from black to a nondescript darkish brown color. He groans and sits up, looking down at his tattered pants that I’m amazed survived this ordeal.

“Ugh,” he says, his hand moving up to run through his hair before he pauses. “I lost my hat.”

“I think that’s the least of your worries right now,” I say dubiously.

“No, you don’t understand,” he says, looking up at, his fingers idly toying with a rather impressive set of sideburns, his thick bristly mustache shifting as he speaks. “I really like that hat.”

Gwen just sighs, slumping against me and hugging me tightly. “Are we done?” she asks, her modulated voice limp with exhaustion.

I nod, leaning my head against hers.

“Yeah,” I tell her. “I think we’re done.”

She glances up at me, a little giggle escaping. “You actually look kinda sexy in your Thor gear,” she says, and I roll my eyes.

“Speaking of which, how’s Lady Thor?” I ask, turning to see the woman herself approaching with a little smile on her face.

“Functional,” she says, eyeing me appraisingly. “It’s a good look for you, but I think I’d like my hammer back. Besides, I don’t think you’re ready for God of Thunder duties.”

“The hammer seemed to think I was worthy,” I say, though I do pass it back to her. That’s a whole lot of power and more responsibility than I’m ready for. The Neighborhood Watch keeps me on my toes well enough these days.

“It’s been known to get a little lax on the definition of ‘worthy’ under the right circumstances,” Lady Thor says as my Thor getup fades to my old costume, though most of the gadgets (goggles, voice modulator, web-shooters) were zapped during my little transformation sequence.

Thank goodness I have a borderline-neurotic need to keep plenty of spares.

“You did well, though,” she goes on, slinging the hammer to her belt. “I can see why the hammer was calling out to you. Maybe, if I find myself looking to retire in a few years, I’ll come look you up.”

“I won’t be holding my breath on that one,” I say, and she smirks. “So…what’s gonna happen to Dugan?”

“I need a long vacation, that’s what’s gonna happen,” Dugan grunts, rubbing his forehead as he strolls over to me. “Thanks for knocking some sense into me, though, kid. I hope the other guy didn’t give you too much trouble.”

“Trouble always finds me, no matter who causes it,” I say, and he actually laughs at that.

“Yeah, I know the feeling,” he says. “So I’ll take my share of trouble somewhere where there aren’t a lot of people. Um…tell Bruce I’m sorry about all this. He blames himself, but…it’s no one’s fault, really.”

He gives us one last wave before making his way down the street, disappearing around a corner.

“Can we really just let him go like that?” Jess asks, and I shrug.

“You wanna try and stop him?” I suggest, and she lets a single little laugh.

“Good point,” she admits.

“Pete, Harry says we’ve got military coming up,” Riley tells me. “Tanks, choppers, the whole shebang.”

“Better late than never,” I mutter, striding over before tapping the control panels on the containment units. “Well, we need to get these things somewhere safe. They have an auto-return function, so if one of you guys would contact Dr. Connors – “

“On it,” Gwen says as the containment devices clatter back to their feet, repulsors unfolding and activating to take off, carrying them into the sky. I watch them shrink into the distance, sighing and leaning against a mailbox.

“Spider-Man,” Lady Thor says, and I glance her way to see her casually swinging her hammer. “I believe I should be going, too. It was…interesting, working with you.”

“Thanks for your help,” I tell her earnestly. “We would have been in some serious shit if you hadn’t shown up.”

“All part of the job,” she says, nodding before holding her hammer aloft. With a crackle and a burst of wind, she’s gone, leaving a brief post-lightning smell of burning ozone.

“Nice exit,” I admit to myself.

“Speaking of exits,” Jess says, looking expectantly at me.

“Yeah, let’s get out of here,” I say. “I need a shower in the worst way.”

……

The military rolled up shortly after we got out of Dodge, setting up perimeters, cleanup efforts, and generally fussing over a battle that was no longer happening. There was actually a surprisingly small area damaged by the fight, as we managed to keep the Hulk and the symbiotes reined in fairly effectively.

We were only at it for two hours.

“Ugh, Harry, I have a very important date with your hot tub,” I grumble as I stagger into the penthouse. “Also, like…Taco Bell.”

“So much Taco Bell,” Gwen agrees, following behind me.

“Good luck finding one that’s open,” a voice says from the couch, and we look to see Lana peeking over the back with Jubilee.

“Lana?” I ask, and she climbs over the couch, hurrying over to hug me.

“School got evacuated, and I asked Denise if I could just lay low here,” she says, and I remember Denise is the name of her foster mom. “Then I turn on the TV and see you fighting the fucking Hulk, and….”

“She cried,” Jubilee says as she skips over to Harry and hugs him tightly. “Like…a two-minute rant of every cuss word in existence just sobbing out of her, it was amazing.”

“Sorry I worried you,” I tell her, and she pouts up at me, nuzzling into my neck and sighing.

“The news chopper almost got taken out, so they had to clear off, and it was even worse,” she says, her voice soft, and now I can hear the slight hoarse quality it has post-cry. “I couldn’t even fucking see you risking your stupid fucking head, and – “

“Lana,” I cut over her, squeezing her. “I’m alright. I’m right here. Soak in the hot tub with me?”

She just nods, and Gwen strides over to lead her to where they keep the spare swimsuits. Jubilee and Harry are already curled up in one of his big chairs, Jubilee with her laptop open, and Flash and Bobby are commandeering the TV to set up a Smash session. I spot Johnny over by the window, peering out and looking thoughtful.

“Crazy day,” I say, stepping up beside him, and he grins over at me.

“Yeah,” he agrees. “Feels like I can relax for the first time in a while, though.”

“I know the feeling,” I tell him. “Ever since Venom showed back up, it felt like….”

“Like a book report you forgot is due tomorrow, and you hadn’t even read the book yet,” he says, and I laugh.

“I’m supposed to be the one that’s good with words,” I insist. He just rolls his eyes, leaning against the window. 

“You know, that guy…Dugan,” he says. “I met him once before.”

“Really?”

“Mhm, back when Sue was working with this guy, Reed Richards,” he said. “Maybe you heard of him, he was a science guy.”

“Yeah, he was a big deal like…two years ago,” I say. I went through a brief phase where I was obsessed with space and whatnot, and Reed Richards was a name I came across a lot in articles about aliens and the “mysteries of the cosmos” that were waiting out there.

“He stayed at our aunt’s boarding house while he was going to Columbia University, and Sue and I were visiting one summer while Dad was helping Mom recover from a car crash they’d been in,” Johnny goes on. “So, Sue got this huge thing for him when she was twelve, and later on, she ended up going to Columbia, too. I think she was only there for like a year when Mr. Dick asked for some help with a super-secret project.”

“The rocket launch,” I guess, and he nods.

“See, Reed Richards’d heard about Tim Dugan, who got his Hulk thing from gamma radiation,” he says. “So he wanted to study other types of radiation, like the ones you find in space. He kept going on about how he was going to ‘usher mankind into the next great age’ or some shit. He designed this rocket, funded it with his inheritance from his dad, and next think you know, he’s trying to get the FAA to let him launch it, but they won’t because this was a serious rocket. It had like an onboard research center, and stuff.”

“So he launched it anyway,” I say, and Johnny nods.

“He managed to guilt Sue into it because she was still kinda crazy about him at the time,” he says. “And Ben was his best friend, so he was down for flying the mission. I wanted to go along, because at the time, it sounded like a ton of fun, but Sue was dead against it. Reed found me later and said he would sneak me aboard, and Sue wouldn’t know about it until we were already up there.”

“That’s…pretty sketchy,” I say, and Johnny sighs, giving a little nod.

“I mean, in hindsight, yeah,” he says. “But…Reed was charismatic. You remind me a bit of him, but…he was also a complete sociopath. He wasn’t up there just to study cosmic radiation, he wanted to expose himself to the stuff in a huge way. And he wanted us to join him.”

“Why?” I ask.

“To see what would happen,” Johnny said with a shake of his head. “He went on this huge spiel to us about how Tim Dugan was evidence that mankind could be capable of great things if we just stopped playing it safe and took a risk once in a while. I think he and Sue argued back and forth for like ten minutes before he told us he was going out there whether we wanted to or not.”

“’Out there’?” I ask.

“The dumbass had this observation deck thing that he hadn’t insulated from any kind of radiation,” Johnny said. “He just walked right out onto it, and…we didn’t really see what happened to him because Ben got right back to the controls and turned us back toward Earth.”

“You didn’t see or hear anything?” I ask, and Johnny shrugs.

“As the engines were powering up, we heard…something on the other side of the door, and when we landed, we saw that the deck had been ripped open,” he explains. “I think he mutated into some crazy monster and busted out and died up there. That’s probably what let some of the cosmic radiation in and mutated the rest of us, but not quite as much as him.”

“Wow,” is all I can say, shaking my head.

“And…I dunno, seeing Tim Dugan after all this time kinda…brought it back, I guess,” he says. “I mean, we definitely came out of our little incident better than he did his.”

“And now you have a bunch of super-pals to fight crime with,” I say with a grin, and he smirks, clapping me on the shoulder.

“And friends,” he says. “Been too long since I’ve had actual friends, so…I’m grateful for that. Thanks, Pete.”

“No problem,” I insist.

“Anyway, enough of my drama,” he says. “Your harem awaits, and I wanna get in on this Smash tournament.”

“I’ll jump in later and show you how it’s done,” I say, standing, and he raises his eyebrows.

“That sounds like a challenge, Mr. Parker,” he says.

“You’re on, Mr. Storm,” I shoot back before heading down the hall to find my swim trunks, my head spinning with this new information.

Reed Richards…. I never really knew much about the guy, other than he was often compared to Stephen Hawking in regards to his sheer intelligence. Apparently, intelligence doesn’t equate to common sense or even rationality. It is often said, though, that the most brilliant of minds are more prone to psychological issues.

Still, to risk the lives of his friend, potential girlfriend, and a kid like that….

That’s beyond an issue; that’s just plain sociopathy, like Johnny said.

Looks like he didn’t get the memo about great power.

I slip out of my costume, pulling away the shot-to-shit web-shooters and mask. Wow, my uniform got really torn up in that fight. There are rips and tears all along the legs and arms, and a few holes in the mask itself. I might be able to sew them up, but it might also be time for a new one. Do I have any spares back home? I forget.

Maybe Spidey will be getting a new look.

Stepping into my trunks, I get a good look at myself in the mirror. My hair has gotten long, but it still fits fine under my mask, so I’m not worried about it. Right now, I have a serious case of “mask-hair”, though, like a bowl-cut gone horribly wrong. I run my fingers through it, shaking it out a bit, amazed at how tired I look in general. There are dark circles under my eyes, which contrasts with the general pallor I’ve acquired from running around in a costume that covers every inch of my skin on a regular basis. I look like a particularly well-preserved zombie.

Maybe it is time for a vacation. School is out in about a month, and I’m sure Tony would be willing to loan me a beach-house for a weekend getaway.

Peter Parker, with his friends in high places.

For now, though, the day has been saved, the evil has been vanquished, and the warriors have returned triumphant from the battle. All that’s left is to soak it up in a hot tub and actually let the most important girls in my life dote on me for once. It’s been a roller-coaster of a weekend, but the ride is over for now.

Tomorrow is a brand new day.


	9. Chapter 9

Nick Fury wasn’t one to gloat. In fact, he felt that gloating was just inviting the enemy to prove you wrong, to pull something out of his ass that would prematurely end your victory celebration with alarming certainty.

 

In this case, though, he felt that maybe a little gloating was warranted.

 

Thanks to Director Rogers’s quick thinking (and an admitted gamble in regards to Norman Osborn, Tony Stark, and the X-Men that had proven to be a wise call), Hydra was once again beaten back into the shadows. He had no illusions that they were gone forever, but at the very least, SHIELD wouldn’t have to worry about Hydra using them as some kind of symbiotic host to grow within and eventually use to get their hooks in the United States. Even as Fury settled into his office for what was supposed to be just another work week, he knew that SHIELD was expunging all traces of the psychotic organization, quietly escorting the Hydra sympathizers from the building under the pretense of an employee retreat for those that had shown an abundance of commitment to the company.

 

It was almost too easy to appeal to their ego and send them off to a secluded woodland retreat where they would be soundly arrested and tried for treason.

 

“Deputy Director Fury?” a voice asked, and Nick looked up to see Agent Coulson standing in the doorway to his office with his ever-present half-smile, toting a file in one hand. “The Latveria report, for your perusal.”

 

“Of course,” Nick said, gesturing at his desk before leaning back in his seat. It was good to see his “good eye” again. “I’m sure it’s more exciting than anything else I’ve got to read.”

 

“I can assure you it is,” Coulson said, moving to his desk and tossing the file in front of him. “Stark and Osborn…. They’re good. They’re not necessarily what SHIELD is looking for, but I think they’re what SHIELD might need from time to time.”

 

“That’s exactly what Steve Rogers had in mind when he first proposed the Avengers Initiative,” Nick said, smirking as he pulled the file to him and opened it, his good eye narrowing at the sight that greeted him.

 

“On that note,” Coulson said, “I took the liberty of including extensive notes on a discovery I think we’re both rather interested in.”

 

Nick looked from the page up to Coulson, who stared back with his ever-unflappable expression.

 

“What am I looking at?” Nick said.

 

“Respectfully, sir,” Coulson said, “one of the most amazing discoveries of modern time.”

 

As he skimmed through the words of the file that greeted him, Nick Fury had never been more inclined to agree with anything in his life.

 

……

 

I’ve never wanted to move less in my entire life.

 

God, it feels amazing to just lie here, nothing to fight, no psychotic space goo to corral, no having to wrack my brains to cobble together some tool to survive the next eighteen hours or something. It’s just me, the Hester Street YMCA swimming pool, and a ridiculous-looking inflatable pink pool raft currently meandering around the water. The Neighborhood Watch has presently taken control of the whole building, courtesy of an obscenely generous donation from Oscorp on behalf of Harry Osborn.

 

The ceiling spins and pans slowly across my field of vision, the halogen lights currently off, as the giant floor-to-ceiling windows on the wall are letting in plenty of noonday sun. I can hear the soft burble of conversation from the edge of the pool, Jess (whose interest in swimming seems to have waned a bit since gaining fire powers—shocker there) and MJ (currently just taking a short break from a spirited game of Marco Polo) chatting about one thing or another. I know Kitty and Lana are somewhere nearby, but Gwen is unaccounted for.

 

Or, she is until I feel a slight buzzing of spider-sense, but it’s that harmless, tickling variety that means she’s nearby and planning some shenanigans.

 

“Hi, Gwen,” I say as I hear the telltale splish of her emerging from the water. She gives a soft huff, and I see her leaning over me with a little pout. I must have floated to the shallow end at some point. Droplets of water patter down onto me as her waterlogged hair hangs around her face, framing her face so that it’s all that I see.

 

Not that I’m complaining.

 

“Spider-sense sucks sometimes,” she grouses. “All I wanna do is a be a cute spontaneous girlfriend, and I can’t because you always know when I’m around.”

 

I smirk at her, and she rolls her eyes, smiling as she leans down to plant a small kiss on my lips.

 

“I could act surprised next time?” I offer, and she giggles, giving me another little kiss.

 

“Gosh, you would do that for little ol’ me?” she asks in a sweet voice. I just reach up, cupping her cheek and giving it the lightest of squeezes.

 

“You’re so amazing,” I say. Her smile turns from a wry little smirk to a genuine expression of tender affection.

 

“Pete…” she says, warmth in her tone. She leans down and kisses me a third time, giggling. “I love you so much.”

 

“Love you, too,” I tell her immediately.

 

She giggles and grabs onto my raft, giving me a gentle little push, and I find myself drifting across the water to be stopped by a giggling MJ, whose head is just poking out of the water. Apparently, she slipped back into the water while I was distracted. She moves around to the side of my raft, her face inches from mine.

 

“Say kisses,” she whispers softly.

 

“Kisses,” I chuckle, turning my head, and she plants a small kiss on my lips.

 

“Mm. This is nice,” she says, humming as she drifts along with me in the water. “Just a little mini-vacation thing.”

 

“It is,” I say, smiling over at her. “Life has been ten shades of crazy lately. I like just…being able to relax. All my friends safe and sound and having fun.”

 

“And girls in bikinis all over the place,” MJ says with a little wink. I just shake my head.

 

“You’ll never hear me complaining about that,” I admit, and she giggles, kissing me again. “Hey, are we…alright with the kissing and stuff? I mean, we’re still doing this on the down-low, right?”

 

“Jess has Lana and Kitty distracted, and…” MJ trails off, humming thoughtfully. “Well, we’ve got it covered. You worry about saving the world, we have the home front take care of.”

 

“I’m lucky to have such amazing girlfriends,” I tell her, and she smiles, leaning in for another kiss.

 

“Right?” she snickers, nuzzling her nose against mine. “So…do you ever think about…more?”

 

I shift on the raft to look at her quizzically, not sure if I heard her right. “More?”

 

“Mhm,” she says as we float through the deep end, MJ clinging to my raft to stay afloat. “I mean…Lana likes you an awful lot. I’m sure you’ve noticed, right?”

 

I snort. “She’s dropped a couple hints,” I mutter wryly. It’s only slightly obvious, between keeping me up until midnight most nights with some admittedly hilarious texts and borderline-flirtatious Snapchats of her “just being lazy in bed”, or her tendency to sometimes drop the sass and just sort of look at me with this uncharacteristic warmth in her eyes before she catches me noticing and sort of pats my cheek in the world’s slowest slap.

 

She’s an enigma, for sure.

 

Wait…I think I can see where this is going….

 

“Lana?” I ask, and MJ nods with a little smile, floating along with me as we meander back towards the shallows.

 

“Gwen was planning to ask her tomorrow, if you were okay with it,” she says. “We all actually talked about it this morning, while you were sleeping in. What do you think?”

 

“I…how big are you guys planning on taking this thing?” I ask dubiously. MJ giggles before climbing out of the water to sit on the edge of pool. I float near her knees, watching as she reaches down and toys with my hair.

 

“It’s not like we’re scouting for new girls or something,” she says, swishing her feet around in water. “We’ve just noticed how…I dunno, how much Lana has improved, I guess. She’s not as angry as she was, and I think it’s because of you. Pete, she’s crazy in love with you. You know that.”

 

Well, she’s as much as told me on more than one occasion. And I have to admit, Lana’s had some days where she’s been downright happy. I think I even saw her smile in a completely sincere, not-mocking way once.

 

It was sort of adorable.

 

“Well, I suppose if she’s…you know, into the idea,” I say. “She needs more happiness in her life.”

 

“And you’re just the one for that,” MJ insists, smiling down at me.

  
We fall into a companionable silence, MJ just running her fingers through my hair, taking in the peaceful moment. In the week since the Hulk thing, life has settled down to a more acceptable level of crazy, and the Neighborhood Watch has resumed business as usual, cleaning up the streets, putting thugs out of business, and doing what we can to maintain our lives as students.

 

One of the more memorable patrols was spent with Riley, Gwen, and me pelting Harry with questions about an upcoming Bio exam. He managed a solid B-plus, and that’s actually why we’re here, chilling at the Y. I wanted to do Sunday patrol, of course, but Gwen, MJ, Jess, Kitty, _and_ Lana all did the _eyes_.

 

Five sets of them!

 

So, we’re on call in case any city-threatening badness goes on, but we’re taking some time to relax. Besides, according to the news, we’re not the only vigilante team that’s crept up in the past few months. A few other enterprising folks have taken to costumed crime-fighting as well, not to mention the old hats like Daredevil and the Punisher (though the latter’s methods leave a bit to be desired).

 

Speaking of fellow crime-fighting groups….

 

“No Riley today?” MJ asks with a thoughtful hum.

 

“She’s with that other spider-group,” I say. “Cindy and her new pals. She’s really into this whole mentor thing she has going with them.”

 

“How did that even happen?” MJ asks. “I mean, just suddenly, a bunch of kids with spider-powers, surprise.”

 

“Riley told me that from what she’s heard, two of the spiders had a bunch of little baby spiders before they were recovered,” I say, “and the Stegron fight busted open their nest.”

 

“So, are we gonna have like a second wave of mutant spider-monsters?” MJ asks, eyes widening at the implication.

 

“Nah, we already told Dr. Connors, and he’s got the Chameleon bots cleaning up the site,” I say, staring up at the ceiling. “I even asked if he needed help, but he says he’s got a guy.”

 

She hums thoughtfully at that, canting her head to one side. “He has a guy?” she asks. “Who?”

 

I just shrug. “No clue,” I say, though I can’t help but be a bit curious, myself.

 

Who would Tony Stark trust with one of his most private, hush-hush projects?

 

……

 

Tony lived by one rule.

 

Well, alright, he lived by several rules.

 

That wasn’t really true, either. He actually vacillated between carefully-crafted, meticulously executed plans and flying by the seat of his pants.

 

But he did so with such aplomb that people believed he was always in control of his life.

 

Maybe _that_ was actually the one rule: always _look_ like you know exactly what you’re doing, but don’t be afraid to improvise when the occasion called for it.

 

After a bit of unpleasant business liberating the small European nation of Latveria from the clutches of a megalomaniacal warlord (typical Tuesday stuff, really), Tony found himself once again stateside. The day had been saved, the evildoers were currently being rooted out (not his problem), and he and Norm were now free to steer Oscorp toward the future. The company had held together in their absence, and R&D had even picked up after the hiring of some fresh talent from MIT, but it was good to be home. Being Iron Man was fun, but it was time to once again step into the Tony Stark pants (lovely tailor-made Armani) and science the world’s skirt up.

 

First order of business was some new music. Fall Out Boy? What was this, high-school?

 

“Jarvis,” he said, plugging his AI into the console at the center of the room. “Play my ‘Get Pumped’ tunes.”

 

“ _Of course, sir_ ,” Jarvis said, and Tony glanced around the room, taking a moment to appreciate the looks of awe on his newest employees’ faces as they realized that  the music had changed, all of them looking up to see that the man himself had returned to take control.

 

“Hello,” he said with a little grin as they all gravitated toward him, though Tony noticed with satisfaction that they all took measures to reach a stopping point in whatever little projects they were working on. Reiko (Koko? Nah…Go-Go) made her way toward him first, followed by Aiko, who (after some shameless Facebook stalking, a must for potential employees in this new Generation Y world) Tony gathered went by Honey-Lemon in certain circles. Tadashi the wunderkind was already tapping away at the other side of the console, and his bosom buddy, Pineapple Express, was asleep on the couch, covered in Taco Bell wrappers.

 

Amazing.

 

“Mister Stark,” Tadashi said with a look of wonder. “Um…welcome back, sir. You should’ve phoned ahead or something, we would’ve cleaned up – “

 

“No problem, I prefer to see my minions in their natural habitat,” Tony said, tapping at the holo-display. “Jarvis sync up with security footage and all logged terminal usage. I want _you_ to know everything that’s happened in this building since we left just in case _I_ need to.”

 

“ _Syncing…synchronization complete_ ,” Jarvis said. “ _Red flags detected. Displaying_.”

 

Tony leaned in and peered curiously at the screen. Parker had apparently designed himself an AI at some point. Rudimentary at best, a glorified Siri mod, but still impressive for a kid his age. Tony had already heard from Curt that the kid had used his suits (and apparently gotten Veronica pretty thrashed) in a fight against the Hulk. Understandable, really.

 

“Clear red flags,” Tony said, seeing Tadashi nearby, smiling at the holo-display. “Thoughts?”

 

“He has a long way to go,” Tadashi said with a small chuckle. “He named his AI Baymax. Not sure if I should be flattered or offended.”

 

“I usually settle on flattered,” Tony said. “I roll out Jarvis and a few weeks later, he’s got a speak-and-spell that from the looks of it was already fairly taxed doing what he designed it for? Still, good first try.”

 

“Credit where it’s due, he did pretty alright,” Tadashi says, chuckling. “Anyway, from what Pete’s told me, that whole Thor thing fried _his_ Baymax. I guess mine won’t have to worry about being usurped anytime soon.”

 

“Yes, he did mention that you became privy to his little…secret,” Tony said, giving Tadashi a beady gaze, and Tadashi just chuckled, shaking his head.

 

“I owe both of you way too much to worry about what kind of hobbies you have,” he says. “Heck, Aiko’s spent every spare minute making him some kind of suped-up web-shooters, and I think Reiko’s designing some kind of hoverboard for his friend. She’s pretty serious about the whole magnetic hover technology thing.”

 

“Well…Parker could stand to take a step back, stop trying to do the whole school-inventing-superhero thing,” Tony said. “You should really never have more than two major hobbies in your life, and let’s be honest, I’ve seen enough TV shows to know that school and saving the world are enough for most mild-mannered teens.”

 

“You’re telling me,” Tadashi chuckled, turning back to the screen.

 

“Speaking of saving the world, though, how’s _your_ Baymax doing?” Tony asked, and Tadashi nodded toward a corner, where a large white monstrosity of a computer tower was plugged into the wall and wired to round white helmet. Two large black stickers had been placed on the helmet, a line of black Sharpie marker connecting them, forming some approximation of a face. According to Tadashi’s designs (which were rather brilliant—Curt had been giddy when he’d shown them to Tony), the device was able to map out every nook and cranny, every crevice, every neuron and synapse of the human brain. It was able to paint the most complete physical picture of the mind technologically possible.

 

It was also, sadly, incredibly expensive to use, which was why it was able to land Tadashi a job at Oscorp R&D but hadn’t been able to get any real traction in the medical field, at least not in any hurry.

 

“I actually had him brought out of storage a few days ago,” Tadashi said. “He might just be the next breakthrough in Project Vision.”

 

“Your Earth-shattering AI thing,” Tony said with a questioning glance at his newest employee. “You mentioned that in your e-mails.”

 

“You read those?” Tadashi asked, sounding pleasantly surprised.

 

“I’ve had a lot of spare time over the past month or so,” Tony said with a wave of his hand.

 

That was actually a gross understatement. Avengers business wasn’t nearly as much fighting of Hydra goons as he’d thought it would be; too often, Tony had found himself monitoring a slew of recon drones and intercepting encrypted transmissions. The fun hadn’t started until near the end.

 

Rhodey had insisted it wasn’t _supposed_ to be fun, beating the tar out of a base full of psychotic Nazis and blowing up said base in a fireball that might have been visible from space. But it most definitely had been.

 

“So, tell me more about this,” Tony said, calling up all the e-mails that Tadashi had sent him about Project Vision and displaying them on the holo-screen. “You think you can map a human brain and use it as a…a template for a new kind of AI?”

 

“I think so,” Tadashi said with a nod, tapping at the display to bring up a few of some of the more complete medical diagrams of the human brain. “The human mind is, in some schools of thought, the most complex computing system in the world. Thanks to Baymax—my Baymax, at least, we have one of the most complete pictures of it possible. But it’s like…looking at a map with no towns or states or anything. We can see all of this stuff, and we can even understand some of what we’re looking at, but….”

 

“You need a Lewis and Clarke expedition,” Tony said, realizing even as he said it that that just wasn’t enough. “Oh, you need…Lewis, Clarke, _and_ …I think I know _just_ who is going to play your Sacagawea.”

 

“I don’t think it’s pronounced like that,” Tadashi said.

 

“Nuance,” Tony said, shaking his head as he tapped a few buttons on the console. “Jarvis, phone call, Xavier School for Gifted Youngsters.”

 

“The X-Men?” Tadashi asked in bemusement.

 

“I spent some time with a few of them recently, and I learned about one that might just fit the bill for mapping out the way the brain works,” Tony said, staring up at the screen as the phone rang. Moments later, a click sounded.

 

“ _Xavier Schools Youngsters, how Doop help_!?”

 

“Doop, when did you start learning English?” Tony asked with a small frown. “I even had my translation software ready and everything.”

 

“ _Doop learn human-speak, ask Kitty Pryde to marry_!”

 

“Who is…Doop?” Tadashi asked, and Tony shrugged.

 

“No one’s really sure,” he said aside to Tadashi before looking back at the screen. “Doop, you wanna put me through to Charles, please? Tell him it’s Tony with a favor to ask.”

 

“ _Please hold_ ,” Doop said, and tinny elevator hold music started playing.

 

“So,” Tadashi said as what sounded like a rather blown-out version of _My Heart Will Go On_ played over the speakers. “Doop?”

 

“There’s a lot of strange things in the world, kid,” Tony said. “You can reflect, or you can roll with it.”

 

“ _This is Charles Xavier_ ,” a voice came over the phone. “ _How may I help you_?”

 

“Professor Dumbledore, how _are_ you today?” Tony said with a grin, and he heard a small chuckle from Professor X.

 

“ _Good afternoon, Tony_ ,” he said in a wry voice. “ _To what do I owe the pleasure of your call_?”

 

“I was wondering if Miss Jean Gray was in,” Tony said. “I have a small internship to offer her.”

 

……

 

“So, Miles, he just goes _careening_ into this hot-dog stand, and like…oh my gosh, Riley, there were hot dogs everywhere, and he was just…crawling out of it covered in mustard and relish and ewwww!”

 

Julie Power was rewarded with the sound of Riley’s cackling laughter, the brunette’s whole face lighting up with amusement, and she allowed herself a small moment of pride. Riley had been a bit on the grim side when they’d first met her, but Julie was gradually getting her to open up and get to know her.

 

Of course, now Julie was fighting back a small hero-crush on the Scarlet Spider, but that was beside the point.

 

“I can just imagine the look on his dopey face!” Riley guffawed, and Julie snickered at the memory of Miles’s expression, a mingling of shock, confusion, and indignation.

 

At least they’d caught the Ringer.

 

“Oh, I shouldn’t laugh like that,” Riley said. “Miles is pretty cool.”

 

“He’s a sweetheart,” Julie agreed with a thoughtful little hum. “You know, um…he and I used to be a thing.”

 

“A boyfriend-girlfriend thing?” Riley asked, canting her head to the side, which caused her currently loose brown hair to fall in a curtain down her shoulder.

 

“Mhm,” Julie said. “I mean, we only kissed like once, and it was kinda whatever. It just didn’t…feel like we were actually dating.”

 

“Huh,” Riley said, and Julie mentally chided herself. What did Riley even care about this? She’d just met the girl like a week ago. “Well, it’s good you guys are still friends, at least.”

 

“He’s pretty great,” Julie said, nodding. “He’s got a bit of a bro-crush on your cousin, though.”

 

Riley just sighed, shaking her head. “Seems like _everyone’s_ got a bro-crush on Peter,” she said, and Julie knew she’d plucked _another_ nerve. That was all Riley seemed to be, like that Minesweeper game she’d once found on Dad’s computer. Julie could bring up the wrong topic, and Riley would shut down into a brooding anime character, but…but sometimes (and more often lately), Julie would say something, and Riley would light up, with that huge smile, unmasked mirth in her baby-blue eyes.

 

And Julie would get those nice-but-uncomfortable warm and fuzzy feelings in her chest.

 

“You don’t really…get along with him?” Julie asked, hoping she wasn’t just digging herself deeper. But she felt this need to know Riley better, to _understand_ her.

 

“That’s…not really it,” Riley said, turning those intensely blue eyes back on Julie. “It’s…. He has all of these friends and girls just fawn over him, and….”

 

“You just want a little piece of the pie, too?” Julie asked, and Riley rolled her eyes.

 

“Are you sure you’re only thirteen?” she muttered. “Or are you just a mind-reader?”

 

Julie giggled and scooted a bit closer to Riley, glancing up at her. “Well…if it’s any consolation, there’s no place I’d rather be than right here with you.”

 

Riley tensed a bit, her face turning red, and Julie froze when she realized just how “giggly schoolgirl with a crush” that sounded. To her credit, Riley seemed to take it in strike, bumping Julie with her shoulder.

 

“That’s a lot of consolation, actually,” she said, and Julie was granted the rare sight of a warm smile from Riley, and no, there were the fluttery anime doki-doki heartbeats.

 

_You just met this girl, Julie, get a hold of yourself!_

 

“Um…so…” Julie cast around for some kind of topic that wouldn’t make her sound like a lovestruck girl. “So, I was thinking of what my superhero name is gonna be.”

 

“Oh, yeah, you still need one of those,” Riley said, reaching into the Arby’s bag next to them and pulling out another couple sliders. She passed one to Julie, who took a huge bite. At first, the gnawing hunger had been a bit embarrassing; Julie had actually been considering a diet before the spider incident, but now, she was packing away food like her middle name was Gluttony. Riley had been quick to assure her that her metabolism would burn it off in hours, and sure enough, after a few rounds of saving the citizens of New York from ne’er-do-wells, she was already experiencing a rumbly tummy all over again. The fact that Riley was next to her, shamelessly wolfing down a roast beef slider, made her feel quite a bit better.

 

“I _wanted_ to go with Black Widow,” she said, hoping she didn’t sound too pouty. “I mean, then we would kinda match, you know? Black Widow and Scarlet Spider?”

 

Riley rolled her eyes. “I don’t even really _like_ that name,” she said. “I mean, the press just sort of decided that’s what I’m called, and it was too late to try to change it. Besides, Black Widow’s Gwen’s, and name-changes are hard.”

 

Julie hummed thoughtfully, tucking a lock of hair behind her ear. “Well…I could go with…like, Spider- _Girl_? I mean, it’s kinda, like, unoriginal, I mean. Spider powers, Spider-Man – “

 

“That was very spur-of-the-moment, and it stuck,” Riley said loftily, sounding mildly huffy. “Still…Scarlet Spider and Spider-Girl. That rolls off the tongue nicely. If you wanna go with the whole superhero duo.”

 

“Why do you think I keep bugging you to go out and patrol?” Julie asked shyly. “I kinda really like your company.”

 

For some reason, Riley seemed quite touched by that, smiling over at Julie and bumping her with her shoulder again. “Likewise,” she said, and Julie hummed happily. Riley finished off her latest slider and stared out over the city.

 

“So…wanna like swing around and patrol a bit?” Julie asked, smiling up at her companion.

 

“Three seconds,” Riley said, scarfing down the last few bites of a huge order of curly fries. Julie snickered as she watched Riley inhaling mouthfuls of the food, and Riley glanced over curiously. “What?”

 

“I’m really glad you found us that night,” Julie said fondly. “You’re an awesome mentor.”

 

Riley paused briefly as she chewed away at a bunch of fries, gulping down the mouthful of food and peering over at Julie with a small blush.

 

“Okay, let’s get going before you embarrass me into a coma,” she said, and Julie tossed a balled-up wrapper at her newest friend.

 

“You think you’re the only one that’s embarrassed?”

 

……

 

Well, this is a bit embarrassing.

 

I don’t think I’ve ever gotten below an A-minus on anything, like…ever, but here I am, the Monday after our little pool trip, being presented with a shiny C-plus on the latest Literature test.

 

I guess the Cliff-Notes version of Frankenstein just wasn’t enough.

 

I’m sorry, Mr. Robinson, I was a little too busy fighting the Hulk to read about _fictional_ monsters.

 

“So,” Mr. Robinson said, moving back to the front of the room, “now that the fun part is out of the way, let’s hear some thoughts. Can anyone tell me who the bad guy is in Frankenstein?”

 

I glance around, seeing some kid named…Kevin or Kyle raising his hand. Mr. Robinson gestures at him.

 

“The monster?” he said, and Mr. Robinson shrugged.

 

“Was he?” he asked. “Why do you think that?”

 

“Well, he killed a lot of people,” Kevin/Kyle said.

 

“That’s true,” Mr. Robinson said. “If nothing else, the monster was indeed a murderer. But it looks like Riley has a though to share with us.”

 

I turn to see Riley lower her hand with what I’m told is a stubborn expression we share when we feel particularly opinionated about something.

 

I prefer the word “passionate” myself, but that’s just me.

 

“I think Frankenstein was the bad guy,” she says, and Mr. Robinson smiles proudly.

 

“And why is that, Miss Benson?” he asks.

 

“Well, because of his pride,” she says. “He had something to prove, and he didn’t care if he had to step all over the laws of nature to do it.”

 

“That’s extremely true,” Mr. Robinson said. “Pride is one of the central themes of Frankenstein, or many people think so. Viktor Frankenstein was tired of conventional science, so he decided to apply his considerable intellect to attempt to give life to a creature of his own creation. He felt that he was worthy of playing God. And he wound up paying the price for his hubris.”

 

“Well, the monster was no angel,” Kyle (I just remembered his name is Kyle) says. “He killed people, he followed Frankenstein around and stalked him and made his life miserable.”

 

“Only because Frankenstein is the reason he exists in the first place,” Riley said. “If you just suddenly existed one day and everyone treated you like some kind of freak, wouldn’t you wanna get back at the guy that made you? The monster never _asked_ to exist.”

 

“Frankenstein was a bad parent,” another kid said from the back of room, and just as soon as the tension in the room notched up from Riley’s statement, it dissipated with a chuckle.

 

“All excellent points,” Mr. Robinson said, looking pleased at the little debate. “In fact, many have said that the relationship between Frankenstein and his monster is analogous of a father and particularly unruly son.”

 

“So the monster’s just going through his emo phase?” a girl says from the corner (I think her name is Sajara or Sanjali or something), glancing back at me as I look at her and giving me a smile.

 

“Maybe minus the black guyliner,” Mr. Robinson says. “Even so, I’m glad that all of you feel so passionately about the themes of this book. Even if some of your _test_ scores don’t necessarily reflect that.”

 

The bell rings, and I stand before his judging gaze can fall on me. I was _busy_. I join Gwen, who gives me a small concerned look before glancing at Riley, who is in the midst of brushing past us. I’m just wondering how to approach her after her little tirade when Harry saves me the trouble.

 

“Yoooo, that was an epic little rant you had there, Miss Missy,” he says, dropping onto Riley’s shoulders in a hug and walking with her to the door. Riley yelps and toddles forward under his weight, though she can most certainly handle it.

 

There’s no way Harry weighs ten tons.

 

“Riley – “

 

“I know,” Riley cuts me off, and I’m pleased that she doesn’t look as agitated as I thought she might be. “I just…the more I read that book, the more Frankenstein became…Doc Ock. And the more monster sometimes felt like…y’know, me.”

 

“Hey, if that thing had turned out anything like you, Frankenstein would’ve been a fucking hero,” Harry said, patting her shoulders. “And he would’ve gotten just a bunch of people like…’Do it again! Do it again!’.”

 

Riley grinned up at him, rolling her eyes. “You always know exactly what to say to just make the clone-angst go away.”

 

“That’s because we’re tribal buddies,” Harry says, shifting to wrap her under one arm and grab me under the other. “C’mon, we’re gonna do it.”

 

“Harry, don’t,” Gwen sighs.

 

“No, it’s been a long time coming,” Harry says. “We have to.”

 

“Harry, for real, if you – “

 

“HALLWAY TRIBAL!”

 

At once, the three of us burst into dance, Riley giggling and shaking her head after a few seconds before stopping. Harry and I aren’t at it for long, if only because Ms. Jonson is already eyeing us warily from the doorway to the French classroom. Gwen ushers us along with a roll of her eyes, giving a small tug to my sleeve as Harry and Riley walk ahead, throwing _Bio-Dome_ quotes back and forth.

 

“Hey, I talked to Lana,” she says softly. “She’s…iffy.”

 

“Iffy?” I ask. She smiles wanly.

 

“I think she’s…I dunno, she’s got a lot of crap behind her, you know,” she says. “A bit of…baggage.”

 

“And now she’s being invited to a…whatever we have going on,” I say, and Gwen nods.

 

“Give her some time to think about it,” she tells me, smiling. “I think she’ll go for it once she gets to process it.”

 

“Pete,” a voice says, and I turn to see Lana herself looking at me with an uncharacteristically shy expression. “Um…two minutes?”

 

“Go ahead,” I tell them, glancing at Harry, who’s in Study Hall with me. “Make an excuse?”

 

“Potty break,” Harry says. “Mr. Odenkirk’s cool, he’ll buy it.”

 

They walk ahead, and Lana takes one of my hands, dragging me down a side hallway to an exit, where a little partition before the actual exit door offers a small bit of privacy. She pushes through the door and pulls me along, glaring up at me. After a tense second, she speaks.

 

“I am so…stupid in love with you that I actually sometimes get mad at myself for letting it happen,” she blurts, biting her lip. “I…I’m scared. I haven’t exactly had…I mean…. I suck at feelings. And whenever I felt things about people before, it always went to shit, and…. I can see myself getting into something like this, with you and a bunch of other girls to…to help me not fuck it up. But I’m…I have no idea what I’m doing, so if I do something stupid, you have to…. I mean, you’ll be patient, duh. You’re…you. And…and I’m gonna kiss you right now, and it’s not gonna be like last time, right?”

 

I blink, but I manage to answer, “Not at all.”

 

She lets a huffy little sigh. “Good.”  


And then she’s kissing me, with just as much gusto as our first (somewhat badly-timed) kiss, but we have no reason to break it off or regret it later this time around. She clutches onto me and I can feel her trembling, but as we settle against a wall and gently pull apart, she calms a bit, staring up at me with wide eyes.

 

“I’m gonna try so hard not to fuck this up,” she says softly.

 

“Hey, you think I have any idea what I’m doing either?” I point out, and she lets a little snort as she backs away.

 

“Point taken,” she says, dragging me back toward the halls. “C’mon, we can tell Baldy I had a minor panic attack and you were talking me down. I’d believe it.”

 

This is not all what I had planned for my romantic life in high school.

 

……

 

This wasn’t the kind of thing Joe Robertson had in mind when he signed on to the Daily Bugle.

 

Yeah, okay, journalism _could_ be dangerous, but part of the draw for him had been the decision to stick with the interest human interest pieces like a school bake sale or a woman celebrating her fiftieth anniversary at whatever retail outlet or grocery store she’d been working with for most of her life. Heck, lately, he’d barely found himself in the field at all, sticking to the offices and reining in Jonah’s inane desire to vilify the latest round of spider-heroes doing their best to keep New York safe in their own unusual way.

 

How ironic it was, then, that he’d encountered the most dangerous situation in his life on his day off? All he’d wanted to do was take his kid to the zoo for his tenth birthday, after a quick pit-stop at the bank to take out some cash.

 

“Everyone on the ground, hands on your heads!” the gunman yelled, waving a rifle of some kind around at them. “You play nice, don’t make a fuss, and no one has to get hurt, right?”

 

Lowering himself slowly to his knees, Joe looked his son in the eyes as the boy did the same.

 

“Dad?” he asked, eyes wide, and Joe shook his head.

 

“It’ll be alright, Randy,” he said quietly. “Everything’s gonna be fine.”

 

“Plus-size, on your _knees_!” another voice said, and Joe hastened to kneel as a woman in a ski mask charged over to them.

 

“I am, I am,” he said. “I got a bad knee is all.”

 

“Don’t look at me, kid,” the girl said, and Robby place a hand on his son’s head.

 

“C’mere, bud,” he said, pulling Randy’s face into his jacket. “Sorry, Miss, my son’s just nervous. We don’t wanna cause no trouble.”

 

The woman scoffed but walked away, and Joe wrapped an arm around Randy, pulling the boy to him.

 

“Just keep your head down, Randy,” he said quietly, trying to stay calm for his boy. “We’re gonna be fine, alright?”

 

“I bet Spider-Man’s on the way already,” Randy whispered, and Randy couldn’t help but feel a bit of pride at how collected his son was staying in this situation. “You’ll see, Dad.”

 

This was one of the reasons Joe was a closet fan of Spidey; he gave kids hope. Randy could be sobbing right now, and Joe wouldn’t blame him a bit, but here he was, confident his hero would be here to save the day.

 

If only they were so lucky as to –

 

_Thwip-thwip!_

_Thwap! Thwap-thwap!_

 

“ _I think I played this game once!_ ”

 

“ _I really don’t think this is the time to be pointing that out_!”

 

Two modulated voices sounded as several of the robbers found their weapons yanked away by webs, and two costumed figures dropped to the floor. Joe just had time to surmise that this was not Spider-Man or any of his friends that the public knew about before the two started beating the tar out of the criminals.

 

“ _Oh, shit!_ ” one of the boys, a short, scrawny kid in a yellow costume shouted as one of the robbers whipped out a pistol and leveled it at him. He quickly kicked it out of the man’s hands and zipped closer, socking him in the chest hard enough to send him flying. “ _Fuck, did I kill him_!?”

 

“ _Phage, careful_!” the other yelled, ducking under a swipe from another of the robbers, the woman that had hassled Joe and Randy, and tripping her feet out from under her before webbing her to the floor. “ _Spidey’ll be pissed if we, y’know, kill someone_!”

 

He was wearing a mostly black costume with a red web design and spider logo. Jeez, were there more of them popping up now? Jonah would be pissed when he found out.

 

“ _No, no, Athena says he’s alive_ ,” the other said. “ _Joke’s on you, Ricochet, I can totally punch someone_ without _killing them_.”

 

“ _So can most of the rest of world, don’t act like it’s something to brag about_!” the one called Ricochet said, leaping nimbly over another robber and socking him soundly in the back to send him sprawling to the floor.

 

_Thwip-thwip!_

 

The robber was webbed to the floor alongside his companion, and Joe saw Ricochet glance toward one of the remaining robbers as he raised a gun.

 

_Thwap-thwap!_

 

“ _Got him_!” Phage said, yanking the gun away. “ _Fuck him up, Ricochet_!”

 

“ _Isn’t it just a good name_!?” Ricochet said, leaping toward the disarmed man so fast that Joe wasn’t sure he didn’t just teleport. He socked the man in the jaw, sending him flying into a wall, where Phage webbed him up and left him suspended.

 

It had only taken a minute or two, but the situation was now completely defused.

 

“Spider-Man?” Randy asked quietly, standing and staring at the pair with eyes wide with awe. The one in red turned to them and made his way over, leaning down to peer at Randy.

 

“ _Sorry, little dude_ ,” he said with a shake of his head. “ _But I’m a friend of his. I’m helping him keep New York safe_.”

 

“What’s your super name?” Randy asked, and the kid chuckled into his voice modulator.

 

“ _I’m Ricochet, ’cause I jump real fast_ ,” he said. “ _That’s my best friend, Phage. He says he’s got some kinda sciencey reason behind his name, but I think he just picked one that sounds cool_.”

 

“It really does!” Randy said, and Ricochet laughed again.

 

“ _I’ll let him know_ ,” he said, glancing up at Joe. “ _You alright, Mister_?”

 

“You’re new,” Joe said. “Friends of Spidey’s?”

 

“ _More like coworkers, you could say_ ,” Ricochet said with a sheepish scratch at the back of his head. “ _Working on friends. But…yeah, we help him out_.”

 

“Thank you,” Joe said. “You’re…probably gonna catch a lotta crap in the press, but…my son and I are okay, thanks to you. You’re alright by me, and…probably everyone here. I hope you don’t let a little bad press get to you, is all I’m saying.”

 

Ricochet nodded. “ _Spidey told us there were gonna be a lotta people with loud voices that don’t like us, but we do what we do for the little guy_.”

 

“ _Hey, Ricochet_ ,” Phage said, hurrying over. “ _We got sirens outside. We should jet_.”

 

“ _Who uses ‘jet’ like that anymore_?” Ricochet said as the pair webbed onto the ceiling, crawling up through a skyline.

 

“Dad, isn’t that awesome?” Randy said. “Spider-Man’s getting more friends to help save the city!”

 

“That _is_ pretty awesome, Randy,” Joe admitted. “I just hope his new pals are up to it.”

 

……

 

“Dude!” Ganke said as he yanked his mask away. “Dude, we just saved like a hundred people from getting killed!”

 

“ _Ganke, we saved like ten_ people, maybe,” Miles said, tugging his own mask off. Those things got stuffy after a while, and it was a bit disconcerting to listen to your voice be all modulated and twisted until you sounded like Darth Vader or something. “I mean, yeah, it’s cool, but let’s be real.”

 

“I’m being as real as real can be,” Ganke said with a grin, hopping up and down in place. Even now, weeks after their little spider incident, it was still unnerving to see his once-rotund Asian best pal now skinny as a bean pole and sporting a lithe musculature that would make Bruce Lee nod in respect. “We saved some people, changed some lives, man! Why won’t you revel with me!?”

 

“I’m reveling, bro,” Miles said with a chuckle. “I’m stoked, I really am. That was awesome, and we did good.”

 

“We did _awesome_!” Ganke said, eyes wide with utter joy. “Bro, we saved those people! That kid is gonna be like our number one fan for life!”

 

“He thought I was Spider-Man,” Miles said with a smirk. “I had to shatter his little dreams.”

 

“Nah, you _changed_ his dreams,” Ganke said, clapping Miles on his shoulders. “You showed him that you don’t have to be Spider-Man to kick some ass and save the day. You can be a like Black-Hispanic hybrid or a weird Asian kid and do it, too.”

 

“I hate to break it to you, but he couldn’t exactly see us under the costumes,” Miles said. “Heartwarming as your story is.”

 

“Then maybe _that’s_ the lesson,” Ganke said. “Doesn’t matter who you are, the costume hides everything but the heroics.”

 

“Damn,” Miles said with a chuckle. “That’s some philosophical shit right there. Color me impressed.”

 

“I’m telling you, you can be the Luke Skywalker hero, but I _am_ your Yoda,” Ganke said. “Be the hero, but I’ll always be there to drop some knowledge on you.”  


“Just don’t expect a piggyback ride anytime soon,” Miles said, prompting a snort of laughter from his best friend.

 

“Bro, if I ever seriously ask you for a piggy back ride, you know I’m either out of my fucking mind or drunk,” he said. “Or both.”

 

Miles shook his head with a rueful smile, making his way to the edge of the rooftop they were on and settling onto the ledge, Ganke climbing up next to him.

 

“This is pretty insane,” Mile said, shaking his head. “I’m mean, we’re pretty much superheroes.”

 

“Not bad for a couple of nerds from Brooklyn, right?” Ganke pointed out, and Miles just laughed.

 

“Nah,” he said. “Not bad at all.”

 

……

 

George hated to admit it, but lately, he’d found himself looking forward to what he preferred to call “spider intervention” in his cases.

 

Sure, Gwen and her friends were technically operating outside the law, and by rights, he should bring them in for questioning, but they had a rather unfortunate habit of disappearing before any real effort could be made toward detaining them. Not to mention, most of the time, they left behind criminals that had been apprehended and detained with no lasting damage done and crime scenes mostly untouched outside of some obvious signs of a struggle in the course of said apprehension.

 

He could piss and moan about accountability and the chain of command all he wanted, but the fact was that his daughter and this Neighborhood Watch were getting real, lasting results. Crime was down. Citizens were singing praises for Spider-Man, the Black Widow, and their super-powered friends. Even some of the police officers were coming to him with stories of the Black Widow saving them from a gunfight that could have gone south, Firestar beating the tar out of a human trafficking ring, or the Silver Surfer swooping in and laying waste to a mob of drug-dealing degenerates.

 

Much as he wanted to label it as pure interference and tell Gwen to stop, he couldn’t do so in good conscience. She was doing well. She made sure to set it up so that procedure could be followed as closely as possible. There were plenty of contingencies in place for dealing with vigilante efforts, especially lately, and Gwen was extremely diligent in ensuring the NYPD could take advantage of them as much as they could.

 

It almost felt like they were partnering up, like Gwen was setting him up to do his duty as police captain in every way possible. In her youth, Gwen had talked about joining the police force in the general childish desire to follow in her parent’s footsteps, but it felt more and more like she was following through on that dream, if in a rather…unconventional way.

 

“What are we dealing with, DeWolff?” George asked as Jean joined him.

 

“Typical bank robbery attempt,” she said, glancing around at the lobby. The fancy faux-antique furniture and posh upholstery was ripped and upended, fake potted plants strewn about the place, and in a few places, drinks and snacks had been discarded in a mad rush to get out, leaving a sticky residue on the floor that officers were taking care not to step in. “Guns, ski masks, even a getaway vehicle parked out back. Token effort, really. They just weren’t counting on Spidey and his friends.”

 

“So Spider-Man intervened?” George asked. Peter was usually more methodical than this; his crime scenes bore little to no structural damage. Something could have gone south, or it could have been some of his friends. The criminals had been extricated from the webbing and taken in, but the residue still remained, wisps of the material drifting down to the floor, at least in some places. George knew that Gwen’s webbing didn’t dissolve, being naturally occurring. Had she been through here, fighting off the robbers in hopes of bettering the city?

 

“Actually, eyewitnesses say it was a new pair of crime-fighters,” Jean said, consulting her notepad. “Call themselves…Phage? And Ricochet. Spidery-looking costumes, and one witness said they claimed to be friends of Spidey’s. He on some kind of recruitment drive?”

 

“Better him than the Kingpin,” George pointed out, and Jean nodded.

 

“No argument there,” she agreed. “Didn’t we hear a rumble or two that he was looking to take over this bank?”

 

“Yep, this is the one,” George said. “Probably sent these guys to cause a scare, make ‘em a little more agreeable to his proposal.”

 

“I don’t think he was counting on that…Neighborhood Watch of Spidey’s,” Jean said. “Did you know they have a website out there? With profiles and a little message board where you can post tips on what they should be looking into? One of ‘em even posts these ridiculous music videos like those skateboarders do.”

 

“Hard to argue results, though,” George said. “Five robbers detained, no casualties, no real injuries, even.”

 

“You’ve certainly done a one-eighty,” Jean said with a smirk. “What happened to ‘Vigilantes like this have no business on our streets!’?”

 

“You won’t get far in this world without learning when to admit you misjudged a situation,” George said. “Get too stubborn, convince yourself you’re right, you’ll learn the truth the hard way.”

 

“I guess that’s why you’re the captain,” Jean said, and George gave her a wry smile.

 

“Well, it’s not because of my good looks,” George said, and Jean rolled her eyes.

 

“No, those get you all kinds of _other_ little bonuses,” she said, whapping him in the shoulder with her notepad. “Alright, I’m gonna make some rounds, see if we can’t pin this to Fisk.”

 

“Doubt it,” George muttered. “That guy didn’t get where he is by leaving a trail.”

 

“Well, maybe those spider-kids can find a trail,” Jean said with a significant look back at him. “If only we knew someone who had an in with them.”

 

Sometimes it felt like Jean could read his mind.

 

……

 

Lana was still kind of freaking out.

 

She could still remember the heat of Peter’s kiss, the feel of his lips against hers, the giddy little joy of knowing that she was _allowed_ to do that, that she was, for all intents and purposes, Peter’s girlfriend.

 

Sure, she had to share with three other girls, but they all seemed…pretty hella cool, actually.

 

Ever since Spider-Man had stopped at her last-ditch plea for help, turned and saved her life, it was like…this burning pit of need. She _needed_ to be part of his life, any part. She _needed_ him around, or it felt like the world would consume her, chew her up and spit her out. But with Peter, she felt invincible. The world could throw anything at her, but Peter would protect her, galvanize her into an unbreakable rock that _couldn’t_ be chewed up.

 

If she was honest with herself, it wasn’t the healthiest mindset, being so dependent on someone else, but her life was already kind of a pile of shit. With Peter, she felt like the shit wasn’t actually shit but just mud, and she could sort of dry the mud out and build it up into some kind of…not-shit existence.

 

Ugh, sometimes she felt like Bella Swan but with a different set of mental health issues.

 

The bus stopped, and she jerked herself from her thoughts, standing and making her way out into the wilds of Manhattan. She’d managed to nail out all of her homework in Study Hall, so after a quick check-in with her foster mom, she had been allowed to hop the next bus to the Osborn penthouse.

 

Her foster mom seemed to just be thankful that she had such a wide circle of friends. What would she think if she knew that most of those friends were vigilante superheroes?

 

She trotted along the sidewalk, glancing at the last text from Pete on her phone.

 

**_From: Jackass I’m In Love With_ **

_[We’re heading out now, but you should still stop by if you can.]_

_[Miss you already.]_

 

God, her face warmed up all over again as she read that second text. She could almost hear his voice, with its dorky earnestness that took all of the stupid corny sentiment such a statement would normally carry and transformed it into complete heart-melting sincerity.

 

This was why she was so in love with the dumbass! He could take any schmaltzy I’m-so-stupidly-in-love-with-you statement and make it sound like he’d just thought of it and was trying to use to express how…well, how in love with you he was!

 

She was so distracted by her sheer annoyance with how unusually giddy she was that she didn’t even notice that her usual shortcut down a small alley behind a restaurant or something had led her into the midst of seven or eight guys that were so obviously thugs that they may as well have been wearing shirts that said “I’m a gang member, look!”. What had to be the leader of the little posse sauntered up to her with a hunchbacked “thug walk” that probably would have made Lana roll her eyes if she wasn’t mildly concerned.

 

“’Sup, girl?” he said. “’Chu doin’ walkin’ around these back alleys, eh? Sweet thing like you could get hurt, you know?”

 

“Look, I’m just heading for a friend’s place,” Lana said, frowning as she backed away from him, bumping into a much larger member of the group, who leered down at her. “C’mon, back off, alright?”

 

“You’re scarin’ her, Pauly,” the big guy said before mimicking Lana’s voice in a mocking high pitch. “’Back off, alright?’”

 

The rest of them laughed, and Lana sneered at them, prompting more laughter.

 

“Fellas, I think we should take it upon ourselves to escort this lost little lady to safety,” Pauly said. “It’s only right, you know?”

 

“What’s the safest place there is, Pauly?” another scrawny dickhead asked from near a dumpster.

 

“Why our official headquarters, of course,” Pauly said. “Young lady, you should definitely come with us. It’s for your own – “

 

“ _Okay, ‘for your own good’ is where I draw the line, and I’m being generous with the line_ ,” an amazingly familiar modulated voice cut in, and in short order, Pauly and his large friend were unconscious courtesy of Peter Parker’s feet. He landed in the middle of the circle of thugs, moving to Lana’s side and wrapping an arm protectively around her.

 

“It’s Spider-Man!” one of the guys said.

 

“C’mon, guys, we got him outnumbered!” another more enterprising member of the gang said, whipping out a knife. The rest raised various improvised weapons like chains and brass knuckles, but Lana noticed two of them had guns of some kind. Pete stepped fully in front of her.

 

“ _I’m gonna push you behind that dumpster_ ,” he said quickly, and Lana glanced up at him.

 

“Wha – agh!” Lana was suddenly shoved behind a dumpster, tumbling to her knees and quickly crawling to peek around the edge as she heard a couple of gunshots, screaming when one of them pinged off the side of the dumpster. She watched as Peter socked one gunman in the jaw, sweeping the other’s feet out from under him and delivering a solid punch to his head.

 

“ _Lana!?_ ” he called.

 

“I’m fine!” Lana called back. “Kick some ass!”

 

“ _I love when you talk like that_!” he shouted back, effortlessly dodging a lunging jab from another gangster’s knife, grabbing his wrist and lifting him over his shoulders to slam him into the ground. He spun away from a punch from another, taking advantage of his attacker’s overbalancing hop to whap him soundly in the back of the head and sending him sprawling to the ground.

 

_Thwip-thwip!_

 

A clung from the dumpster she was hiding behind announced another attacker’s sudden collision with the metal, his knife clattering to the pavement as he groaned and slumped to the ground.

 

The last two were quickly webbed together, stumbling and falling to struggle futilely against their bindings as Peter hurried over, kneeling in front of her.

 

“ _You alright_?” he asked, and Lana rolled her eyes.

 

“Sometimes I think you’re such a dork, but then you remind you’re also a total badass,” she said, and she was rewarded with a modulated chuckle as Pete helped her to her feet.

 

“ _You know, I was hoping I’d get to see you before I went out on patrol_ ,” he said. “ _I guess I sort of got my wish. C’mon, hang onto me and I’ll get you to Harry’s place. Jubilee’s ordering Chinese_.”

 

“I hope I’m not pulling you away from anything super important,” Lana said as she climbed onto his back. Suddenly, she could understand why Kitty didn’t seem eager to stop hitching a ride with him. She had to cling to him with everything she had.

 

Everything.

 

“ _Nah, how much trouble can Harry and MJ get up to without me to help_?” he asked.

 

……

 

“ _I just wanna reiterate that this is a terrible idea_ ,” Mary Jane said as she clicked along on her spider legs, following Harry as he hovered silently into the old hospital. “ _Like…I’ve been around for some of your bad ideas, but this is definitely the wors_ t.”

 

“ _Some of mankind’s greatest achievements were the result of a terrible idea_ ,” Harry said.

 

“ _I feel like that’s just one of those things people say without knowing whether or not it’s true to try to sound like they know what they’re doing,_ ” Mary Jane shot back, and Harry scoffed.

 

“ _You wanna bail, I won’t judge_ ,” he said. “ _I just wanna have a look around_.”

 

“ _Oh, bullshit_ ,” Mary Jane said, clicking her night vision on as the dark hospital loomed around them. It had been abandoned since the Stegron incident and declared structurally unsound. Apparently, it was due to be demolished soon enough, but until then, it was a popular hangout spot for some of the braver neighborhood teens looking for a place to rebel or something.

 

It had also, until a few months prior, been the nest of sorts for two of the escaped spiders from Oscorp. Though the two had been captured, Norman hadn’t been counting on them having a whole host of spider-babies, and the offspring’s bites were just as potent as their parents, imbuing Cindy Moon (who had been looking for a scoop for her Journalism class) and her new friends (apparently just on some kind of urban safari) with spider-powers not unlike Peter, Riley, and Gwen’s. Tony had sent a full team of Chameleon bots as a hazmat team to clean up the spiders, but Harry was convinced that they probably missed a few.

 

That was what brought the pair to hospital. Harry was on some kind of fool’s errand to get himself bitten and be re-powered, and Mary Jane was here ostensibly to try to stop him. But…if she was honest with herself, she was morbidly curious to see if she couldn’t get some spider powers of her own.

 

It wasn’t out of any measure of jealousy; she just didn’t want Pete and Gwen to handle her with such caution. They tried to hide it, but Mary Jane could tell they worried about her. They always made sure to group her up with two other “supers”, even though more often than not, the powered members of the Watch only felt the need to work in twos unless something huge was going on.

 

She and Harry had actually had a lengthy conversation over Facebook (one of their first after his little Venom incident) about the whole thing. She knew Peter and the others meant well, but the two of them were getting tired of being the “sidekicks” of the group, relegated to partnering up with the powered members of the Watch.

 

So here they were, on one of the most ill-advised expeditions Mary Jane could remember. She’d never been a fan of hospitals in any capacity, but a creepy abandoned hospital that had at one time been infested with spiders?

 

She was just glad she had her Jackpot armor.

 

“ _You know, the Chameleon team probably wiped out every single spider in this place,_ ” Mary Jane said. “ _Or, our luck, we’ll just find like a normal Brown Recluse and you die_.”

 

“ _Someone’s looking at the glass half-empty_ ,” Harry said with a shake of his head. “ _All I see is the return of the Tarantula and the rise of the new and improved Jackpot._ ”

 

“ _I’m still…I mean, Harry, we’ve all seen the news reports_ ,” Mary Jane said, remembering well at least one point where a mutated spider-beast had tussled with the cops before being smacked down by the Human Torch. “ _I’d rather not make the five o’clock news rampaging around the city_.”

 

“ _MJ, you’re being ridiculous_ ,” Harry said. “ _We’d be breaking news, no waiting until five_.”

 

“ _Of course, how silly of me_ ,” Mary Jane said flatly, shaking her head. Harry climbed from his hoverboard, walking around the derelict lobby of the hospital. Graffiti tags covered the walls to the point that there was more spraypaint than the original paintjob. Empty bottles and food wrappers littered the floor, and more than a few old crack pipes, syringes, empty baggies, and other drug paraphernalia told Mary Jane exactly what sort of people lurked around this place. “ _Love the décor_.”

 

“ _Yeah, urban gutter trash with a hint of tetanus_ ,” Harry said. “ _Gah. Bee_.”

 

He waved his hand in front of his face as some kind of large bug buzzed around his helmet, Mary Jane right behind him as he walked around the receptionist counter. It zipped down around his chest and back in front of him, where he swatted at it again.

 

“ _Little bastard’s not giving up, I’ll give him – ah_!” he jerked his hand away. “ _Ah, it stung me! Shit, that hurts_.”

 

“ _Harry, are you – oh_!” Mary Jane gasped, her foot twitching as a stinging pain shot up her ankle, and she tripped over a chunk of debris as she instinctively hastened away from the source of the pain. “ _Ow. I got…ow, stung by…s-something. Harry, I don’t feel good_.”

 

Her vision was already swimming, the floor seeming unsteady under her feet. Harry was leaning heavily against the counter.

 

“ _Oh, fuck_ ,” he said. “ _Shit, I think I might be allergic to wasps or something. Damn_.”

 

“ _Harry, I don’t feel good_ ,” Mary Jane said again, her hand feebly scrabbling at her wrist for the distress beacon she kept there, only to find it already blinking.

 

“ _MJ_ ,” Pete’s voice sounded in her ear, sounding frantic. “ _MJ, are you okay? Your distress beacon’s telling me your vitals are low_.”

 

“ _Pete…_ ” MJ couldn’t find the energy to get her voice any louder than a reedy little squeak. “ _I’m scared_ ….”

 

“ _MJ, I’ll be right there_ ,” Pete said, his voice urgent. “ _I’ll be there, okay? Hang on_.”

 

The last thing she heard as blackness claimed her was a faint echo that sounded like Peter’s voice saying something else, but she couldn’t make any words out.

 

……

 

Son of a bitch.

 

Son of a…bitch!

 

I knew it wasn’t a good idea to let those two patrol together without at least one of us along. Sure, they were good, but I’ll be the first to admit that my armor designs are meant more for a support role. If they happened across some kind of super-criminal or someone like the Vulture and got themselves hurt because of my suits, I’ll never forgive myself.

 

I’m webbing faster than I’ve ever gone before, the streets flying below me. Johnny’s the only one that managed to meet up with me, zooming along in his wingsuit as I speed toward our destination. The distress beacons went up just as I was leaving Harry’s place, from the very same hospital that Cindy and her new pals had gotten their powers.

 

What are Harry and MJ even doing there? My first thought is that Harry might be trying to regain his spider-powers the old-fashioned way (as old fashioned as a juiced up irradiated spider can be considered), but even _he_ can’t be willing to entertain such a stupid, reckless idea. Right?

 

Actually, the more I think about it, the more it seems right up his alley.

 

I come to a landing outside the hospital, rushing in and seeing a group of guys in ratty clothes around two unconscious figures. It looks like they’re trying to peel away the armor from Jackpot.

 

No, that’s not gonna fly.

 

I charge forward, shoving away the nearest guy hard enough to send him flying across the room and tumbling over a receptionist counter. The others quickly jump to their feet, but once they see who it is, they freeze.

 

“ _Five seconds_ ,” I tell them. “ _Four, three, two…._ ”

 

They’re gone by the time I reach three.

 

“ _Athena, life signs_?” I ask frantically, kneeling next to MJ and scooping her up in my arms.

 

“ _Vitals are—faint but—present_ ,” Athena says in a female version of the late Baymax’s stilted speech patterns. “ _Miss—Watson and Mister—Osborn will require immediate—medical—attention_.”

 

“ _Call Tony_ ,” I say, and two chimes later, I hear his voice.

 

“ _Mister Potter, what are you doing calling me –_ “

 

“ _Tony, I need you to not joke for like five minutes and send like…every medical thing you have to my location_ ,” I say. “ _Please, I…Harry and MJ are in trouble_.”

 

To his credit, Tony’s all business when he responds. “ _I’ve got a team inbound_ ,” he says. “ _What happened_?”

 

“ _I don’t even know_ ,” I say, shaking my head. “ _They went to the hospital where those spiders nested. I think Harry was trying to get his powers back or something. Just…please, I can’t lose either of them._ ”

 

“ _Sit tight, kid_ ,” Tony said. “ _I’ve got a whole battalion of Chameleon bots coming to you. Everything’s gonna be fine_.”

 

I wish those words meant anything anymore.

 

……

 

Words could have much deeper impact than simple memetic meanings. He’d learned that long ago. The human mind could attach to words sensory input that crossed the whole spectrum, and with the right…reinforcement, those words could have a profound impact on the psyche as a whole.

 

One needed only look to the figure before him as an example.

 

A pneumatic hiss sounded, and with a groaning creak that echoed off of the distant metal walls around them, a frozen figure was revealed, thawing out thanks to heating coils that were considered ancient when compared to the technological advances of the modern day.

 

Clearing his throat, he spoke the words he’d been taught in their original Russian.

 

“Longing.”

 

A set of piercing blue eyes opened, glaring at him.

 

“Rusted.”

 

The eyes went slack, becoming the gaze of someone that had long since given up to the wheels of fate.

 

“Furnace.”

 

Now, the sea-blue eyes snapped wide open, and a defiant sneer curled the subject’s lips away from pristine white teeth.

 

“Daybreak.”

 

The subject snarled now, the noise echoing against the walls around them.

 

“Seventeen.”

 

Words started to form, the subject’s mouth forming sentences spoken in an old life long past.

 

“Benign.”

 

The subject slumped with crooning noise that bounced mournfully around the room.

 

“Nine.”

 

The subject was slack against the bindings of the containment unit, panting heavily.

 

“Homecoming.”

 

The subject seemed to go limp, but the white knuckles of the hands gripping the leather straps of the container belied how tense his charge remained.

 

“One.”

 

Those hands gripped the straps with new purpose, blue eyes hiding behind the subject’s eyelids as they fell shut.

 

“Freight car.”

 

Blue eyes sprang back into existence with newfound purpose, staring intently at him, searching for a mission. He waited for the words that would announce his success, the phrase that would tell him this wasn’t just a fool’s errand, that all was not truly lost. After seconds that felt like days, the promised phrase was spoken into the still silence.

 

“Ready to comply.”

 

Hydra would rise again.


	10. Chapter 10

The Oscorp building was…absolutely beautiful. From the outside, it stood out amongst the other buildings like the well-dressed kid at the school dance wearing a tailor-made suit while the rest wore Walmart button-downs and khaki pants. It was a beacon, a glass tower that seemed to radiate a quiet aura of superiority that was just shy of being pretentious. The interior was no less impressive, greeting visitors with a tall atrium at least four stories high. Metal staircases along either wall spiraled up to offices or labs, scientists and businessmen intermittently making their way up or down them. Couches and chairs were arranged in what had to a waiting area, interspersed with precisely-maintained potted plants. In the center, a monolithic slab of marble bore the slogan _“Creating the future, from the mind of man.”_

 

Inspiring.

 

“Can I help you, young lady?” a woman asked from behind the receptionist’s desk.

 

“Oh, um, I’m Jean Grey,” she said, hurrying over to the counter. “I’m…here to see Tony Stark?”

 

“I see,” the woman said, clicking away at her computer for a moment. “Aha, there you are. You’ll need this.” She drew out a Visitor badge and passed it over to Jean. “Just head to the elevator behind me there, and you’ll find Mr. Stark on the sixty-second floor. Enjoy your visit!”

 

“Thanks,” Jean said with a bright smile. The woman’s mind was a glowing ball of cheer, though Jean wasn’t so rude as to go digging around. Surface thoughts tended to blend together into a general mood she could pick up on, though, and while it was still kind of invasive, it did let her tailor her words to appeal to people more.

 

If everyone wound up happy, wasn’t that a worthy cause?

 

She stepped onto the elevator, glancing around for a button panel, but there was none. Huh?

 

“ _Welcome to Oscorp, Miss Grey_ ,” a voice said, causing her to jump as the doors closed. “ _I am Jarvis. Please allow me to see you to your floor_.”

 

The elevator took off, and Jean had to admit that she was a bit impressed. AIs were getting more and more common, but nothing nearly as sophisticated as this Jarvis. Most were like the one that Kitty pondered from time to time, the one called Baymax.

 

Ugh, Kitty. She was so in love with Peter Parker that her mind was practically screaming it. Jean didn’t _want_ to listen in on her love-struck thoughts, but it was hard _not_ to, especially when Jean was visiting Kitty’s room, and even the slightest glance at her growing collection of Spider-Man posters sent her brain on a dizzy swirl of bubbly thoughts about Peter Parker and all of the neat stuff he’s done.

 

It wasn’t difficult to piece two and two together and peg Peter Parker as the wall-crawler himself, but she would never dream of divulging the secret. Kitty didn’t even _know_ she knew, and she was fine with keeping that way. Professor X had taught her long ago that while reading minds often couldn’t be helped, sometimes it was best to just let other people’s thoughts be and not act on them. The world didn’t need to know that Peter Parker was Spider-Man, and it was probably better off _not_ knowing. He was doing some real good, and finding out who he actually was would only serve to ruin his efforts.

 

“ _Sixty-second floor: Research and Development_ ,” Jarvis’s voice said as the elevator opened, revealing a long hallway of sorts comprised of cubicles, currently empty. Jean blinked curiously as she stepped out; she had been told someone would be here to greet her, but looking around, she didn’t see anyone in sight. She took a few tentative steps forward, calling into the distance.

 

“Um…hello? I’m Jean Grey, I was told to…come by?”

 

The only response she got was the sound of some kind of classic rock song she couldn’t hope to identify. What was she to do now? Go back down to the lobby? Look around for someone? Maybe Tony Stark was engrossed in some kind of procedure he just couldn’t pull himself away from? She pressed forward, unable to help peeking into some of the cubicles as she passed by. Technological wonders that would have Hank drooling sat on tables, half-covered in sheets, some of them obviously only partially finished with wires poking out every which where. She wanted to look a bit more closely, but she would probably need about four degrees from MIT before she could even guess what they were for.

 

“Hey,” a sharp voice said as Jean peered closely at a set of gloves that had some kind of devices attached to the wrists. She jumped and turned to see a short Japanese girl a few years older than her with a large pink bubble currently blooming before her face before popping. Chewing the gum, she eyed Jean baldly, brushing her purple fringe out of her eyes. “You’re the mind-reader girl?”

 

Jean nodded, and the girl blinked once, staring at her.

 

 _‘My name is Reiko,’_ her thoughts came at Jean clearly and concisely.

 

“Um…nice to meet you, Reiko,” Jean said, and Reiko smirked.

 

“Neat,” she said, her voice betraying a little amusement before she pointed the hallway. “This way. Stark’s dealing with something, and Tadashi’s helping out. If you want, you can – “

 

“Excuse me,” a new voice said, one Jean vaguely recognized, and a brown-haired boy a couple years younger than Jean stepped around the corner. Even from this distance and without even trying, Jean could feel the tangle of concern, anger, and grief swirling around in his brain, and she wondered what could possibly have happened to Peter Parker to have him so wound up. “Um…I’m Peter Parker, and…I really need your help.”

 

She was summarily led away by a hand on her wrist, though Peter’s grip was gentle even through his urgency. With a dubious look at Reiko, who only shrugged back, Jean let herself be dragged away by the boy she wasn’t supposed to know was Spider-Man. The direct contact, though, only served to increase her “reception”, so to speak, and his thoughts washed over her, painting pictures of a redheaded girl with freckles across her face and the kind of infectious smile that probably broke a lot of teenage hopefuls’ hearts. Peter obviously loved this…Mary Jane girl, but according to Kitty, he was officially dating a girl named Gwen.

 

Curious.

 

She was pulled into another elevator, this one much finer, with paneled wood sides and a plush red carpet. Obviously, this was the private elevator Tony Stark or Norman Osborn likely used to navigate behind-the-scenes.

 

“Jarvis, Clinic please,” Peter said, pacing nervously around the admittedly expansive space.

 

“ _At once, Mr. Parker_ ,” Jarvis said, and Jean felt the little jump in her stomach as the elevator zoomed down.

 

“What’s going on?” Jean asked him, and Pete paused his pacing, turning to stare at her for a short moment. His thoughts continued their swirl, but as he attempted to formulate a response, she was assaulted with more images of Mary Jane, her bright smile, a look of the utmost affection aimed right up at him, a soft whisper of his name in a manner no mere friend would ever speak it, her sleeping face curled up in the crook of his arm, and jarringly, her unconscious figure on a ruined floor, her face deathly pale as he peeled away an armored faceplate, a red tangle of panic as he watched her sleeping for far too long. Sighing, he leaned against the side of the elevator.

 

“I just…I need you to look at a friend’s mind,” Pete said, and Jean tried to hide her incredulity. “Friend”, indeed. “She…she’s in a…a coma or something, and Tadashi says her brain is lit up like a Christmas tree, and I just wanna make sure she’s okay.”

 

Jean smiled at him, nodding. “I think I can do that,” she said, following him off of the elevator and into a small medical clinic. Cots lined the walls at intervals, with metal frames hung with curtained partitions, most of them pulled aside. One bed at the end of the row seemed to be in use. From a distance, Jean could see several IV drips hooked up to the occupant, the steady beep of a heart monitor sounding quietly. Seated around the little curtained area were several kids about Peter’s age, all of whom glanced up expectantly at her arrival.

 

“Guys, Jean Grey,” Pete said quickly. “Jean, this is Gwen, Harry, Jubilee, Johnny, and Lana. And…this is MJ.”

 

He gestured to the girl in the bed, who looked for all intents and purposes to be sleeping quite peacefully, aside from the IVs and monitors stuck into her arms.

 

“Two days ago, she was stung by some kind of…mutated scorpion or something,” Pete went on. “She’s…still working the venom out of her system, but she’s also showing unusual brain activity, according to Tadashi.”

 

“We heard you were gonna be here, so we were hoping you could…take a look,” Gwen said. “Please?”

 

Jean blinked as she realized what they were requesting. Dream-watching was something of a breach of privacy under normal circumstances. The few times she’d ever actually peeked into someone’s dreams had been during slumber parties with some of the more similarly-aged X-Girls. The first one to fall asleep usually agreed to have her dream commentated to the rest of the group, unless it was something completely inappropriate. One of the more amusing instances was Kitty’s Parisian date with Spider-Man, who was wearing a tuxedo with his superhero mask on while they ate under the light of the moon with the Eiffel Tower in the distance.

 

Kitty hadn’t lived that one down for weeks.

 

Still, Jean always made expressly sure _not_ to peek if one of the girls asked her not to. People got nervous around mind-readers that had no respect for boundaries, something Emma Frost had found out the hard way. That said, these five were obviously worried for their friend, and Jean was fairly sure if Mary Jane was awake and one of her friends was the one in a coma, she would be making the same request.

 

Well…it was worth a shot. Her brain was in fact lit up, and Jean couldn’t deny a bit of professional curiosity.

 

Nodding, she moved to the side of the bed, placing a hand to the other redhead’s forehead. It was hot, feverish, and coated with a thin sheen of sweat, and the moment she contacted the girl, visions blotted out her sight, so vivid that it was like she was seeing them herself in person. A schoolyard, basketball hoops, a picnic table. A lunch sat in front of her, and she was working slowly through it while chatting with a familiar brown-haired boy. It was the most vivid dream she’d ever peeked in on. Even her one foray into reading Hank’s attempt at lucid dreaming hadn’t been so overwhelming. She could almost hear the echoes of voices in the yard, the low murmur of the crowd around them. When she removed her hand and came back to the present day, the silence in the clinic seemed to ring with the absence of sound that hadn’t been there.

 

“She’s dreaming about you,” Jean said, turning to Pete with a smile. “You’re in school. Seems like a pretty normal, happy dream. Vivid, though.”

 

The group around her collectively sighed in relief, but Pete glanced up at her at the last bit.

 

“Vivid?” he asked, and Jean shrugged.

 

“I’ve peeked into a few dreams in my time, and it’s like…a haze,” she said. “Kinda like daydreaming, you know? I can only really get a clear picture if I close my eyes or plug my ears or something. Mary Jane’s dream is…really intense. It’s like…like she’s awake but asleep. She’s sleeping here, but she’s…awake somewhere else.”

 

“Like that _Avatar_ movie?” Harry asked. “With the blue cat people? She’s sleeping but she’s in a body somewhere else?”

 

“That’s…actually a pretty good guess,” Jean said. “I don’t know, though. I’ve literally never seen something like this before.”

 

“I just wish I could…talk to her,” Pete said, rubbing his temples. Gwen reached over and gripped his knee, giving it a little shake. He glanced over, and Gwen gave him an expectant look, glancing pointedly at Jean. “But…thanks for your help. At least she’s not in some like…horrible nightmare.”

 

“I could try to send a message to her, if you want,” Jean said. “She’s pretty lucid wherever she is, so it could work.”

 

“Only if it’s not too much trouble,” Gwen hastened to say, and Jean just shook her head, reaching out with her hand and feeling invisible energies wrapping around a nearby chair to drag it over to her before the group’s awed gazes.

 

Telekinesis was always fun to show off.

 

She sat and reached out, placing a hand on MJ’s forehead before closing her eyes.

 

 _‘Mary Jane’_ , she sent the message to the girl’s consciousness. She felt like she was shouting across a huge chasm of some kind, a sort of massive mental valley between her mind and Mary Jane’s. Wherever the redhead was mentally, she was nigh-unreachable despite being right next to her. Jean tried to close the distance, to reach out, but as she leaned out over the yawning depths, she knew that there was no use. She could sooner yell over the Grand Canyon at someone on the other side. Her words would be distorted and unintelligible by the time they echoed across.

 

Suddenly, as she was starting to lift her hand, the fissure seemed to shift, and she lost her balance, her mind, perched precariously right on the edge of wherever Mary Jane had found herself, tumbling in. She saw her vision fade imperceptibly from the darkness of her eyelids to total blackness, the sound around her replaced by a rushing noise that sounded like she was driving at top speed with the windows open.

 

This was new.

 

In a matter of seconds, the blackness around her shifted to a pink so pale it was almost white, shapes forming in the glaring glow. Muffled noises filled her ears, like cotton had been stuffed in them, before sharpening into clearer sounds. She could make out the same chatter she’d heard moments ago during her peek into Mary Jane’s mind, but much clearer. The nebulous blobs around her coalesced into the familiar park benches, trees, students, and basketball hoops. Nearby, Mary Jane sat at a picnic table, Peter across from her, though he was wearing thick hipster glasses that his counterpart didn’t seem to need.

 

It was all so vivid. It felt like she was actually standing in the middle of some schoolyard in Manhattan. A cool autumn breeze blew across her face, carrying the pungent aroma of New York, exactly as she remembered it from her last visit. She would almost believe she had actually managed to teleport to the city somehow, except no one seemed to notice her, a boy and girl walking right by without even acknowledging her sudden arrival. No, this was definitely Mary Jane’s dream, but it was a particularly lucid one.

 

“Oh, hey, I was wondering if…you know, maybe you’d be willing to help me with my Science homework?” Mary Jane was saying as Jean made her way over. “I think I have it, but I could use a super science brain to go over my work.”

 

Peter smiled at her, and Jean felt herself reflexively smile as well as she looked at the unmasked affection in his expression; the Peter Parker in Mary Jane’s dream was obviously completely in love with her.

 

“Yeah, I think I can help out,” he said. “But I feel like you should know, Aunt May and Uncle Ben are probably going to shanghai you into dinner.”

 

“Oh nooooo,” Mary Jane said with a little giggle. “Free home-cooked dinner and your uncle’s goofy jokes all night? How ever will I survive?”

  
“Alright, alright,” Peter said with a roll of his eyes. “You know, they’re gonna think we’re dating if we keep this up for much longer.”

 

Mary Jane smirked at him, canting her head to the side. “I think I can deal with that,” she said in a wry tone, and Jean was sure that Dream Mary Jane was crushing hard on Dream Peter Parker as well.

 

Still, that left the matter of the Mary Jane of the real world.

 

“Um…Mary Jane?” Jean said, her voice reverberating with a strange reverse echo. “Can you hear me?”

 

“Well…so can I,” Peter said, not seeming to see or hear Jean as she stood inches away from their table, calling for his would-be girlfriend. “But…you know, what about Flash?”

 

“Mary Jane?” Jean tried again, leaning closer to the redhead, whose face twisted in a little scowl.

 

“What _about_ him?” she asked, distaste in her voice. “Pete, Flash and I have been broken up for months. I don’t care _what_ he thinks about me.”

 

“Oh,” Pete said, obviously trying to hide a little smile, but Mary Jane’s expression showed that she saw it and was rather pleased. “Well…good. I mean…he’s kind of a….”

 

“Douchebag?” Mary Jane said with a giggle, and Pete snorted, nodding.

 

 _‘Hello?’_ a voice sounded, echoing all around the area, seeming to emanate from everywhere. No one else in the schoolyard seemed to hear, going about their business. _‘Who…who are you?’_

 

 _‘Mary Jane?’_ Jean asked in her head, sending out a mental call to everyone around her, but again, no one seemed to notice. Mary Jane and Peter continued their conversation, the students around them going about their lives oblivious to Jean’s presence.

 

 _‘Who are you?’_ the voice repeated, sounding exactly like Mary Jane as she spoke to Peter, thought with considerably more echo. _‘Where am I? What’s going on?’_

 

 _‘My name is Jean Grey,’_ Jean said calmly. _‘I’m a member of the X-Men, and I’m here to help. You’re in a coma after you were stung by a scorpion, I think. Peter Parker sent me.’_

 

 _‘Peter,’_ Mary Jane’s voice said, and as the girl at the picnic table leaned forward, her form seemed to blur, a secondary figure dressed in a medical gown surfacing before sinking back into her. _‘You mean…my Peter? The one in the real world? This…this isn’t…real. This is like a…a dream or something.’_

 

 _‘That’s right,’_ Jean said, stepping closer and reaching out, her hand hovering inches above the Dream Mary Jane’s shoulder. _‘There’s a Peter Parker out there in the real world waiting for you to wake up. He’s really worried about you.’_

 

 _‘Oh…Peter,’_ Mary Jane’s voice echoed about her, sounding equal parts relieved and distressed. _‘God, he must be worried if he sent you to find me. You’re the…the girl with like psychic brain powers, right? I read your Newsweek article.’_

 

 _‘Oh my gosh, don’t remind me,’_ Jean said with a mental laugh. _‘I let Scott talk me into that, and I’ve never lived it down.’_

 

She was rewarded with a giggle that echoed around her, and as Dream Mary Jane leaned back, a second shoulder bloomed from hers, clad in the same medical gown. Jean reached out and grabbed it, feeling an unbelievable resistance as she yanked at it. Time around her seemed to stutter to a pause at points, slowing down and flickering as she tugged at the shoulder in her grasp. Slowly, a second Mary Jane sprouted from the first, eyes wide with shock as she looked around at Jean and this strange world she’d found herself in. A few more sharp tugs later, she sprang free and staggered to her feet. She had slightly shorter hair, but other than the hospital gown, she looked exactly like the Mary Jane still sitting at the picnic table, quite oblivious to the fact that an invisible Jean had just pulled an equally invisible doppelganger out of her. The new Mary Jane looked around in evident confusion, gasping when she saw her dream counterpart.

 

“Oh…” she trailed off, turning to Jean and biting her lip. “This is…um….”

 

“I’m not here to ask questions or grill you or anything,” Jean said with a smile. “But…Peter’s really hoping you’ll wake up soon, so I hope that whatever you saw here isn’t _too_ much more tempting than what’s waiting out there.”

 

“Well…no, I guess not,” Mary Jane said with a sheepish shrug. “As nice as it is to have Pete to myself, I…I miss the others. In here, I guess it’s just the two of us, and…that’s a lot of pressure!”

 

Jean smiled, taking Mary Jane’s hand. “Alright, um…I can maybe try to take you with me to the surface, but I’ve never really done this with someone else before. You have to want to come with me, though, I think.”

 

Mary Jane nodded, looking around with a morose little smile. “I’m…all he has here,” she says. “I’m keeping him safe, and we’re best friends. I’ve known him since we were just little kids.”

 

“That’s so sweet,” Jean said, glancing at the pair at the table. “I’m sure he’s happy he got to know you.”

 

She nodded, leaning in and planting a ghostly kiss to Dream Pete’s forehead, glancing over at her own dream counterpart. “Don’t you dare ever let him lose that smile,” she said in a stern tone with a warning look at herself. The pair continued to chatter, and Mary Jane just sighed, standing and turning back to Jean. “Okay, I’m ready. Can you wake me up?”

 

“I’ll do my best,” Jean said, taking Mary Jane’s hand again and glancing up at the sky. She’d had plenty of dreams before where she knew it had been a dream but kept it going to see what would happen, only voluntarily waking up when things had settled down. Employing the same technique as in those dreams, she shut her eyes, taking a deep breath and snapping them open –

 

To reveal the clinic before her, a window in the distance showing the afternoon sun streaming in. Jean blinked her eyes, shaking herself to adjust to the abrupt change in scenery. She could still hear the echoes of the schoolyard, could still smell the mixture of Manhattan air and the subtle scents of school lunches mingling together, and it felt like her eyes were even having a bit of trouble adjusting to the change of lighting. Next to her, she heard a soft whine as Mary Jane stirred, and Gwen gasped nearby as Peter sprung to his feet and moved to the other side of the bed.

 

“MJ?” he asked softly. “Mary Jane.”

 

“Ugh, it sounds so weird when you say my full name,” Mary Jane spoke in a groggy voice, and Pete let a breathless laugh, hugging her tightly.

 

“MJ,” he breathed, and Jean caught a little laugh from the redhead.

 

“Hey, Pete.”

 

……

 

“Hello, sir,” Coulson’s voice said and Nick Fury looked up from the stack of reports on his desk to see his number two standing in the doorway to his office. “Quiet day.”

 

“It has been,” Nick said, leaning back in his seat. “That’s never a good sign.”

 

“No one’s reported any unusual activity so far today,” Coulson said, his expression unflappable as ever, or at least it would be to anyone else. Nick prided himself on being able to read just about anyone, and Coulson was no exception. Granted, it had taken him much longer than usual to understand learn his number two in the same way he read anyone else, but he was now able to distinguish the rare days when even Phil Coulson found himself unnerved at the lack of activity.

 

Today was one such day, and Nick didn’t like it. Phil didn’t worry over nothing; something sketchy was happening, and even Coulson was wary of it.

 

“And what do you think about that?” Nick asked. Coulson glanced behind him, watching the door click shut and lock into place.

 

“Respectfully, sir,” he said, “nothing’s this quiet without someone making sure it is. And no one makes sure things are this quiet without a very troubling reason.”

 

“I couldn’t agree more,” Nick said, his good eye narrowing. “I assume you’ve – “

 

“Had the security teams do an extra-thorough sweep of every single floor?” Coulson said. “Two, in fact, one at ten and one just now. I have another scheduled for two o’clock, but frankly, sir, we’re still clearing out the garbage Hydra left behind, and that has left us sadly understaffed.”

 

“What’s the director up to?” Nick asked.

 

……

 

“I know that look, sir,” James’s secretary said with a knowing smile as he walked past. “Up to no good?”

 

“Madeline, when have I ever been on anything but my best behavior?” James asked with a wink, and Madeline rolled her eyes.

 

“Perhaps I should just ask the missus?” she said with a little grin. “That would be a scoop, hm? James Rogers, Director of SHIELD, is a dirty old man.”

 

“Blackmail, is it?” James asked, chuckling as he opened his door. “I’ll have to keep an eye on you.”

 

He stepped into his office, which was just as he’d left it before lunch, not a pen out of place. Shutting the door behind him, he made his way over to his desk and sat with a groan, taking a moment to settle in. He wasn’t as young as he’d used to be, and though he tried to keep in shape, there was only so much he could do to keep the vigor going. The fact was, age was inevitable, and he’d learned to just make it as graceful as possible.

 

A knock sounded at the door, and Madeline’s voice came over his phone.

 

“ _Director Rogers, there’s a cleaning crew here for quarterly upkeep_ ,” she said.

 

“Yeah, let them on in,” James said, watching as four men in jumpsuits with the SHIELD insignia emblazoned on the breast stepped in, wheeling a cart of cleaning supplies and toting along a large vacuum. “Afternoon, fellas.”

 

“Director Rogers,” one of them said with a personable smile. “Sorry to disturb you, but we’ll have this office ship-shape, promise.”

 

“Don’t let me get in your way,” James said with a grin right back, watching as another of the men tapped away at the vacuum, the remaining two reaching into the cart. “Need me to step out?”

 

“Actually, sir, we need you to stick around,” he said, glancing at his companions as he reached into his jumpsuit and drew out a walkie-talkie, speaking into it. “Target engaged.”

 

With no preamble, the other three struck. The one with the vacuum had apparently been setting off a series of miniscule mechanical changes that had transformed the cleaning implement into a high-caliber rifle. The other was sporting a smaller handgun that had probably once been a broom or something, and the third had a stun baton that was crackling with energy.

 

Jesus, technology was just going too far. Common janitorial tools turned into deadly weapons? What happened to the gun hidden in a box of flowers or something?

 

Of course, there was also the more urgent matter that he was dealing with four likely well-trained assassins.

 

“Madeline, Code Herakles!” he yelled at his phone, diving behind his desk and reaching underneath it as gunfire sprayed at him. Thankfully, SHIELD was the kind of agency that prepared for every eventuality, and his desk was completely bulletproof. He withdrew a holdout pistol, gritting his teeth and risking a quick peek out. More shots pinged off his desk, and one came dangerously close to his face, but he had their locations. Bracing himself, he peeked out again, firing off a couple shots. They were most likely wearing body armor, but their cover necessitated a lack of headgear. Two shots connected with the pistol man’s skull, and well…it wasn’t a pretty sight as he crumpled to the ground. After this was over, he would need an _actual_ cleaning crew to come through, preferably one that was familiar with proper bleaching techniques.

 

He sneaked a peek out of the other side of his desk, but he lingered a bit too long, as with a booming sound pain lanced along his side, courtesy of the rifleman. Gritting his teeth, he muscled past it as he spotted the stun baton wielder running his way. Just as he was raising the weapon, James raised his own, and the weapon dropped out of the man’s hand as a bullet blew it apart.

 

“Ah!” the man yelled out, the sound cut short at James grimly fired another bullet at his head.

 

Two left.

 

James reached down and felt his side, which was throbbing dully. His hand came back up stained crimson with his blood, but adrenaline was now surging through his body. Fight or flight was settling firmly on fight. Peeking out from his desk again, he saw the vacuum man frantically reloading his rifle, the fellow with the walkie-talkie having fled at some point. James stood, but as he was bringing his pistol up, the vacuum-rifle was raised, and with a resounding bang, James felt pain blooming in his stomach, blinking in shock as he looked down to see red spreading over his white button-down.

 

His wife had always said they made him look like some kind of uptight business man. She’d always preferred the SHIELD uniform of his old days, with the logo nice and big on the chest.

 

“I’m sorry, Director,” vacuum man said, lowering the rifle. “It’s nothing pers – “

 

_Bang!_

 

A bullet hole blossomed in his skull before he crumpled to the ground, James slumping to his knees as he lowered his own weapon.

 

“N-never…monologue,” he coughed, gripping his desk. He raised a shaky hand, jamming at the red button on his desk. Alarms sounded, and Nick’s voice came over his phone.

 

“ _Director_ ,” he said urgently. “ _Report._ ”

 

“ _I’m…checking out, Nick…_ ” James managed, his voice weak. “ _Do me proud, son. I know you can._ ”

 

With that, he slumped to his side, his vision fading as everything grew cold. The last thought that went through his mind was his wife, the lovely lunch they’d just shared at a fine Italian restaurant down the road. It was a fine note to end things on, and she had their daughter to look after her. Sharon was a capable girl, and Becky would never let her shoulder the burden alone.

 

And he’d taken out three of them. That was gratifying.

 

At that, blackness engulfed him, and the world around him ceased to be.

 

……

 

“Sir, he’s not responding,” Coulson said, glancing around as the alarm sounded. “Should I sound the call?”

 

“See if Wilson is ready for action,” Nick said. “It’s a bit short notice, but – “

 

“Deputy Director Fury,” a new voice said, and they both looked toward Fury’s door to see a man striding in. He was tall, well-built, and an all-around prime example of what the human body was capable of achieving for itself. He wore a mostly-blue uniform with a white star emblazoned on the chest and a striped design over the abdomen. His blond locks were tucked under a cowl that accentuated his strong jaw and bright blue eyes. Strapped to him were all manner of weapons from pistols to rifles to the large carbine that he was currently holding at the ready. “With respect, the words ‘short notice’ don’t mean much of anything. Where’s the enemy?”

 

“Right now, Deputy Fury is the most powerful man in the building,” Coulson said to Wilson, who fixed him with a hard look and nodded, glancing back out into the hallway. He stiffened, holding a hand palm-out toward the Deputy Director.

 

“Stay here,” he said, sparing a quick look to Coulson. “You got him?”

 

“With my life,” Coulson said, and Wilson nodded, seeming satisfied with the answer. He raised his carbine, yelling out into the hallway.

 

“Halt!” he said. “You have one chance to drop your weapon and – “

 

_Kooooom!_

 

He staggered back, but Coulson knew that his suit, being a vibranium weave, would be able stop just about anything short of a full artillery attack. Charging forward, Wilson moved out of sight, and Coulson heard the sounds of a struggle. He glanced back at Deputy Director Fury, who gave him a single nod and hastened behind his desk. Coulson made his way forward toward the door, holding his pistol at the ready and peering out to see Wade Wilson, the recently unearthed Captain America, facing off with someone Coulson had thought just a myth, a tall tale made up to entertain and spook rookie agents.

 

The Winter Soldier.

 

She was just like the stories suggested. Form-fitting black tactical gear only made the metal arm she bore stick out even more than it already would have. A facemask obscured her features, goggles blocking even her eyes. The only acquiescence to any semblance of humanity were the dark brown locks that framed her hidden face.

 

“That’s not good,” Coulson said to himself.

 

Wilson raised his carbine, skidding to a halt feet away from the Winter Soldier, who was stalking toward him determinedly.

 

_Koom!_

 

Coulson’s ears rang a bit as he fired the carbine, but a swift move from the Winter Soldier stopped the round in her metal palm, tossing it aside along with her weapon. She charged at Wilson, who let his carbine dangle to his side, raising a pistol instead.

 

_Bang-bang-bang!_

 

Three quick rounds sounded out, each blocked by a movement faster than Coulson’s eyes could track, that metal hand tossing aside the three flattened bullets. The Winter Soldier collided with Wilson, and the Captain spun her momentum, slamming her into a wall and grabbing at the metal arm before it could seize his throat. Instead, the Soldier’s other arm came up and took a handful of Cap’s collar, lifting him and slamming him against the window on the opposite wall, the bulletproof glass cracking in a spider-web of fractures. Rearing her fist back, the Soldier slammed him again, but Cap was ready, snagging up his sidearm with his free hand and bringing it to the Soldier’s armored face.

 

_Bang!_

 

The mask flew away, blood spattering the floor as the Winter Soldier staggered back, a large gash having formed on her forehead. She glared up at Wilson, who gasped.

 

“My God,” he breathed. “ _Peggy_!?”

 

The Soldier seemed to pause briefly, sneering and charging.

 

At Phil.

 

“Coulson!”

 

“On it,” Phil said smoothly, raising his pistol, but the Winter Soldier was fast, knocking the gun away and gripping Coulson’s neck, lifting him off the ground. Phil felt his air supply cutting off, coughing and gripping at the hand.

 

“Got ya, Phil!” Wilson said, and with a resounding _clack_ , a shotgun was pressed against the Winter Soldier’s back. “Drop him. He’s the head of my fan club.”

 

She did indeed drop Phil, who staggered but managed to stay on his feet. There was a loud cracking sound, and he looked up to see the Winter Solder’s metal hand gripping the barrel of the gun, crumpling it, but Wilson had already let go of it, yanking out two pistols and raising them. The Winter Soldier was ready, though, a solid metal fist sending Wilson flying into the already cracked window, which crunched with his impact.

 

“Coulson, get out of the way!” Fury’s voice came. “She’s after me!”

 

“Can’t do that, sir,” Coulson said, reaching for his holdout, but he was swept up by that metal arm, the Winter Soldier simply too fast for him to keep up with, and tossed unceremoniously behind the woman to smash into the window, which had held together so far against the stress of several bodily impacts.

 

 _Typical,_ Coulson found himself thinking as the window finally gave way with a crackle, and he was treated to a stunning view of Manhattan in the afternoon sun, the roads snaking below between buildings that looked like the models he used to paint meticulously in his childhood.

 

He would be in a much better place to appreciate it if he wasn’t plummeting toward the aforementioned streets with rapidly gaining speed. If there was one good thing to consider about the situation, though, at least the rushing adrenaline from his impending death was blotting out the pain of what felt like a broken shoulder and some fairly deep lacerations over his skull and one of his legs from flying through the window.

 

He saw a human-shaped figure soar overhead, trailed by four smoky exhaust lines, and just as he recognized Stark in his armor, he felt a series of small impacts on his back.

 

_Thwip-thwip-thwip!_

 

His descent slowed, finally stopping as he landed on what looked for all intents and purposes to be a giant spider-web stretching between the SHIELD building and the parking garage next door. He looked around to see a female figure in a skintight super suit swinging in. The suit was mostly black, with some white around the shoulders and a red symbol like a Black Widow’s. Coulson knew exactly who it was. Gwen Stacy, daughter of NYPD Captain George Stacy, operated under the alias Black Widow. If she was here, that meant that….

 

_Thwip!_

 

Spider-Man swooped in next, and Coulson saw that he had apparently also undergone a costume change since he last saw the kid. His suit was still mostly black, with a white spider web design over a blue background over the chest and shoulders and a large black spider logo that took up most of the front.

 

Peter Parker sure did like coming up with new costume designs.

 

“ _Are you ok—wait, aren’t you the guidance counselor_?” he asked, and Phil just blinked at him.

 

Oh yeah, that had been a thing for a little while.

 

……

 

“So, how long has the guy in some kind of robot suit been a thing?” Wade asked as he covered Fury while Tony Stark traded hits with the Winter Soldier while wearing a really spiffy set of metal armor.

 

“Six months or so,” Fury said, both of them watching Iron Man take a solid hit from the Winter Soldier’s metal arm before she was blasted away.

 

The Winter Soldier…. Peggy…. Christ, what had happened to her? The last he’d heard, she’d been captured by the Gestapo and held somewhere in Paris. She’d been presumed dead after the liberation of the city at the hands of the Allies, after days of searching for any trace of her had proven unsuccessful.

 

Steve would be heartbroken if he could see what his first love had been warped into. Of course, these days, he was barely lucid anymore. Wade had been to visit Steve and Bucky in the secure retirement home where they were living out their final years in peace and quiet, but the one meeting had been heart-wrenching. It felt like mere months ago that he was conferring with them on what had ended up being his final mission to stop an all-out aerial assault on the entire world, courtesy of Johann Schmidt, the Red Skull.

 

Now, it was the year 2017, and he was a folk hero, a legend, mentioned in history books alongside figures like Churchill, Washington, and Lincoln. Steve and Bucky were in their 90s, spending their twilight years fighting off dementia. When he’d gone to visit, they’d apparently lapsed back into thinking they were back in wartime, discussing highly-classified mission details with him. The nurses had had to politely usher him from the room, as the excitement wasn’t exactly good for them.

 

All he’d wanted was something familiar to remind him of the past, the days he’d left behind. Now, he finally seemed to be getting that, but his blast from the past was trying to kill him.

 

_Kreeng-SHOOM!_

 

The sounds of Iron Man’s strange hand-cannons echoed through the room, sending Peggy blasting backward, where she rolled to a crouch just as Spider-Man and the Black Widow came crawling through the hole in the window, Coulson clinging tightly to Spider-Man’s back before clambering down and disengaging himself from the situation.

 

“ _Get back, kid_ ,” Iron Man said, holding his arm out as Spider-Man made to intervene. “ _Avengers business. Under-eighteens aren’t allowed_.”

 

“ _If you get your ass beat, don’t come crying to me_ ,” Spider-Man said, withdrawing to cover Coulson with Black Widow. The SHIELD agent seemed to be in pretty bad shape, but he was alive.

 

“ _Your move, Hunger Games_ ,” Iron Man said, and Peggy glared at them, sneering hatefully at the group before lunging.

 

Right out the window.

 

“ _Stupid move_ ,” Iron Man grumbled into his armor, soaring out after her. Wade took a few steps back, readying himself.

 

“ _You’re not actually gonna—oh, he is_ ,” Spider-Man said as Wade charged for the smashed out window, diving through into the sunlight and tucking into a roll onto the rooftop of the parking garage next door. In the distance, he saw Peggy dashing to the other end of the roof and leaping over the side. He tore over the asphalt, ignoring the heat of the summer sun radiating up and feeling like it was going to boil him in his suit. Reaching the other edge, he leaned over and looked down into the crowd, scanning frantically, but in the few seconds he’d lost sight of Peggy, she’d disappeared.

 

He heard a rushing sound overhead, followed by a muted clank as Iron Man landed nearby.

 

“ _So, Peggy is her name_?” he asked quite casually, as though they hadn’t just been involved in a fight for their very lives. “ _She seems lovely. Some…you know, violent tendencies, but I get nervous around crowds, too_.”

 

“She was the love of my best friend’s life,” Wade said, shaking his head. “I thought she was dead.”

 

“ _Well, you’d better scoop her up while you can_ ,” Tony said. “ _I know there might be some latent guilt, catching your best friend’s girl on the rebound, but how many others can sympathize with having to boil your drinking water and not having a TV in every household_?”

 

“Why don’t we start with figuring out why she’s been brainwashed into trying to kill Nick Fury, and then we’ll move onto your demented love triangles?” Wade asked, and Tony’s armor whirred softly as he shrugged.

 

“ _Suit yourself_ ,” he said. “ _Demented love triangles can be gripping stuff, though. Trust me, I’ve seen a few_.”

 

……

 

Kitty hated love triangles, and she’d sworn to herself a long time ago to never become involved in one.

 

How, then, had she managed to become entangled in not just one, but _two_?

 

“Hey, Kitty, can I…um, talk to you for a bit?” Bobby asked, looking uncharacteristically timid as he smiled sheepishly up at her.

 

“Um…yeah, sure,” Kitty said, following him down the little side yard at the X-Manor. It was cloudy, with a breeze in the air that sent the recently-mown blades of grass whipping into little green tornadoes. Despite the overcast sky, it was a beautiful summer day, one that had Kitty walking around in short exercise shorts and tank-top. Sure, she was attracting no shortage of stares from the X-Boys, but she had mastered what Jean called the “withering stare”, a look of such disparaging disappointment that anyone staring at the way her clothes accentuated her body found themselves shamefacedly skulking away.

 

She happened to like clothes that breathed well and offered ample ventilation. If those clothes were a little too “stimulating” to the boys, tough for them. Get a hold of your hormones, you pigs.

 

That was why she liked Peter so much. She spent half of her superhero career being worn as a backpack by the boy who called himself Spider-Man, but never once did he make any kind of dirty comments or even remark on the implications of their positioning. If anything, he seemed more and more determined to find some way for her to travel quickly on her own so as not to tether her to him.

 

He was so cute!  


Kitty was just pondering the irony that she was in puppy love, given her nickname, when Bobby rounded on her with a grim look of determination.

 

Oh, crap.

 

“Kitty, I…um…I really like you,” he said. “And I just…since we’ve been doing this whole Neighborhood Watch thing, and it feels like you and me and Flash and Jess are…well, kind of this friend-group circle, I’ve just…felt closer to you, you know?”

 

“I…yeah, I get where you’re coming from, Bobby, but – “

 

“Kitty, will you go out with me?” Bobby asked, not even giving her a chance to cut off his attempts at asking her out, transparent as they’d been. “I promise, I’ll…do everything I can to be a good boyfriend. I mean…I don’t even know what I _could_ do, but if you just…you know help me out and we work together, I think we could – “

 

“Bobby,” Kitty said holding up a hand to cut him off, and he fell silent. “I’m…I’m sorry, but I just can’t do this.”

 

“What?” Bobby asked, looking at her with disbelief. “What do you mean?”

 

“I’m sorry, I just don’t…. I don’t think I can give you what you deserve,” Kitty said. “You’re a good guy, and you deserve a girl who will…I dunno, be there for you. I just can’t…. Not right now.”

 

“Kitty, I…you…I mean, you know Pete’s with Gwen, right?”  Bobby asked, and Kitty winced a bit; she figured she’d been a bit obvious in how much she was crazy in love with Pete, but even _Bobby_ had noticed. “He’s…I mean, I’m sorry Kitty, but he’s _taken_ , you know that?”

 

Kitty sighed. “Bobby, even if that’s true, I can’t just get over him, just like that,” she said. “And it would so not be fair to you at all if I was trying to date you and get over him at the same time.”

 

Bobby sighed, slumping into himself with such visible defeat that Kitty actually felt bad for him for about two seconds. “Bobby, I’m really sorry,” she said, but Bobby just shook his head.

 

“Nah, no, I…I understand,” he said. “I mean…I don’t like it, but I get it. You really like Pete a lot, hm?”

 

Kitty sighed, shrugging sheepishly, and Bobby just smiled at her.

 

“Look, Kitty, I…I don’t wanna wreck anything between us,” he said. “You’re such a cool friend, and…I know cool, right?”

 

“Of course you do, _Ice_ man,” Kitty said with a small laugh, and Bobby snickered at her.

 

“Kitty, you’re one of my best friends,” he said. “I just don’t wanna lose that. Can we…maybe just forget about this?”

 

Kitty smiled at him, nodding. “Bobby, you’re gonna make someone so happy someday,” she said. “I just…I’m not that girl, okay?”

 

Bobby let a cold breath of air from his nose, shrugging. “Yeah, I…I guess I can deal with that,” he said with a wan smile. “But…I mean, this is just from one friend to another, I mean…he has a girlfriend, and…they love the fuck out of each other, you know that?”

 

Kitty sighed, rolling her eyes. “I know, Bobby, trust me,” she said. “That just…you know, it doesn’t mean I can just _stop_ it, you know?”

 

“Yeah, I get how that is,” Bobby muttered, sighing. He sighed, his skin shimmering blue-white until it was the strange ice-snow texture that he had taken to adopting a lot lately, if only because it usually earned him throngs of grateful girls happy to escape the heat. “Well, I’m gonna go see if Flash wants to do some summer snowboarding, I guess.”

 

He wandered off, leaving Kitty to sigh, leaning against the wall of the manor. She heard footsteps, and she glanced over as Jess strolled around the corner, putting a little too much effort into trying to look like she’d just casually happened upon her.

 

“Oh, hello, Kitty,” she said with a bit too much surprise, and Kitty just rolled her eyes.

 

“How much did you hear?” she asked, earning a wide-eyed look from her friend. Finally, Jess just shrugged with a sheepish smile.

 

“In my defense, I really was on my way over to just chat,” she said. “But…I mean, all of it.”

 

Kitty sighed. “Well, I mean, we all already knew I was really into Peter,” she said, shaking her head. Jess smiled, leaning next to her.

 

“Fair point, but…I’m actually surprised you have it so bad for him that you’d turn down Bobby,” she said. “You guys would be cute together.”

 

“I just…I guess I don’t think I’d be able to give Bobby the kind of relationship he’s looking for,” Kitty said. “It’s hard to get over Pete when I see him every weekend, and he just keeps doing this stuff that’s like….”

 

“Amazing?” Jess asked, a buzzing coming from her pocket. “Oh, hold on one sec, important text.”

 

“Nah, go ahead,” Kitty said, sliding down to sit on the warm grass, tugging at a dandelion and watching as the cottony seeds were carried away in the wind. She held her hand up and watched as some passed right through it on the breeze, the dandelion stem falling through her fingers (literally) and landing on the grass before fluttering away.

 

“So…Peter’s pretty great, hm?” Jess said, sitting next to her, and Kitty nodded, glancing sidelong at her.

 

“You’d know better than me, you guys dated for a while,” she pointed out. Jess nodded, smiling fondly at the memory.

 

“Yeah,” she said, leaning against Kitty as she pocketed her phone. “Um…on that note, there’s something I think we should talk about. See…Gwen had this…insane idea that actually worked out really well, and she’s okay with letting you in on it, so…um…it’s a little weird, but hear me out.”

 

……

 

“This whole story is kind of…weird,” Julie said, and Riley snorted.

 

“Yeah, we get a lot of weird,” she admitted, glancing over at her partner. These days, Pete didn’t even ask, just telling the pair where they would be webbing off to save the city. It was simply assumed among the whole Watch that Julie and Riley would be working together.

 

Riley knew that no one was upset about it, and in fact, most of her friends were pleased to see her spirits improving. It was no secret that she’d always been on the mopey side, with a case of what Harry called “Cloning Blues”, but ever since Julie had stumbled into her life, Riley had been…better. Even she had noticed it, herself. Where she would once find herself drifting into brooding, jealous thoughts about Peter and the life that he’d sort-of-but-not-really taken from her, now she felt nothing but giddy with anticipation of the next time she would see Julie, text her or even just poke at her Facebook page to see what she was up to.

 

Yeah, she was falling hard and fast for this girl, but Julie was the first friend she’d ever made _after_ the cloning debacle, meaning that she had met and befriended Julie _only_ as Riley Benson. It made her feel like she was finally starting to come into her own as a person, to really start making a life out of this weird hand she’d been dealt.

 

Plus…beyond all that, Julie was…awesome. She was a bit like Riley, a bit quiet in her everyday life but revealing an adorably snarky side when the mask came on. And she was an avid reader of all things, from books to comics to manga. The few times she’d visited the Parker household, the pair had just lounged on Riley’s bed and read while listening to some music, occasionally sharing amusing excerpts or even reading the same story and discussing it as they went along.

 

“You’re not wrong,” Julie said in reply to Riley’s comment, munching on a quesadilla from Taco Bell while Riley consulted the latest string of texts from Peter, who had been giving them an update on Mary Jane’s situation before news of a scuffle at the Avengers tower had pulled him away.

 

**_From: Y-Chromosome_ **

_[we just got back from some fight at Avengers tower.]_

_[Everyone’s alright, but the Director of SHIELD got killed.]_

 

“The director?” Julie asked, peering over at Riley’s phone. “That’s so sad. His family….”

 

“One of the downsides of being a good guy,” Riley said, tucking her phone away. “You end up pissing off a lot of bad guys. That’s why we wear masks.”

 

“And make up bug-related names, right?” Julie asked with a little smile.

 

“That’s mostly just a gigantic coincidence,” Riley insisted. “There have been a crazy lot of superpowered spider bites going around.”

 

“And bee stings and…scorpion strikes?” Julie asked.

 

“That’s what Connors thinks,” Riley said. “The toxin report was fairly consistent with the type of scorpion the hospital apparently had on hand for experiments and anti-venom and stuff.”

 

“That’s only really dangerous,” Julie muttered, and Riley nodded in agreement.

 

“Just a bit,” she said. “They’re both lucky to be alive.”

 

Supremely lucky, Riley mused. Reason-to-believe-in-miracles lucky.

 

It was lucky Harry’s blood had still contained traces of the super-soldier serum from his spider-bite, allowing his system to withstand the shock of the wasp’s sting, as the wasp had apparently recently dined on a lunch of super-spider offspring, juicing it up enough that its sting could very well have been fatal but had instead left Harry comatose for about sixteen hours and still feeling feverish.

 

It was bordering on divine intervention that Mary Jane had already apparently been bitten by one of the original Project Solstice spiders, presumably months ago. That had apparently been why she’d been having such strange dreams, and it had given her just enough of a super-soldier boost that she hadn’t been outright killed by the scorpion sting, as anyone else would have been.

 

Riley had yet to sort out how she felt about the whole ordeal. On the one hand, the whole thing could have ended _so much_ worse than it had. On the other hand, though…she could also understand what it felt like to not measure up to the rest of a group and to want to change that. Even now, she still felt like an outsider to her own circle of friends. It was like being replaced, but somehow worse, since she hadn’t ever actually been there in the first place. She’d just come into existence _thinking_ she had.

 

Also, there was the whole gender matter. She had come to terms with the fact that she was a girl and was going to stay that way, and after a fair bit of grumbling, had even adjusted to having female reproductive organs and all that that implied.

 

Thank God for sports bras.

 

She could go on a whole gender-identity crisis, but she’d had her share of identity crises already. Whether she wanted to be or not, she was biologically female, and she’d never bought into the whole Tumblr pronoun game, so she was a “she”, for better or worse.

 

Granted, “worse” seemed to be the name of the game lately, but –

 

“Um…Riley?” Julie’s voice broke through her musings, and a soft hand brushed fingertips over the back of her own. Riley glanced up and smiled when she saw Julie with a concerned look that grew into a smile right back. “You alright?”

 

“Yeah,” Riley said, and when Julie’s smile widened into a grin, she felt all of her reservations fade to nothing, replaced by that warm and fuzzy feeling she’d been experiencing a lot more often lately. No matter what, she could count on Julie, who wanted only to be around her. Julie, who looked at Peter with the indifference of someone looking at a friend of a friend, but who turned to Riley and smiled wide, an expression of unmasked warm affection.

 

“What’s with the dopey smile?” Julie asked with a little giggle, and Riley just shrugged.

 

“I’m just…really glad we found each other,” she said, and Julie blushed but nodded, looking down at her knees.

 

“Same.”

 

The moment that followed was one of the strangest of Riley’s admittedly already strange life. It was some weird combination of an awkward silence but also a comfortable moment of peace between the two. The awkwardness meant that there was something more that they were both just…too nervous to look into at the moment, but the fact that it was mutually there, ready to be explored, was comforting and welcome.

 

The pair had all of two minutes to enjoy this strange new threshold in their relationship before a loud clanging sound from nearby announced a crime of some sort in progress. Riley pulled her mask back onto her face as Julie did the same next to her.

 

“ _Athena, anything local_?” Riley asked.

 

“ _Numerous—muggings—reported by local citizens_ ,” Athena said, and Riley leapt from the side of the building, Julie right behind her as they swung along the street toward the sound of the disturbance, pedestrians shouting and pointing up at them. Riley caught the telltale flashes of a few camera phones and had no doubt that the Daily Bugle would be smearing them across the front page yet again tomorrow, likely implicating them in some kind of mugging spree.

 

The pair landed on opposite walls of an alley crawling down to find a man hunched over and rifling through several purses, sifting through wallets and pocketbooks to unearth cards and bills.

 

“ _Would you believe when I heard about muggings in the area, I was picturing coffee_?” Riley asked, and Julie giggled, the sound sounding no less adorable distorted as it was through Riley’s earpiece.

 

“ _Oh my gosh, can you pictures this guy with like twenty mugs of coffee, just running up to people and like demanding they take them from him_?” she asked as the mugger looked up at them with dawning horror, realizing the situation he’d found himself in.

 

“ _That’s the kind of mugger that would make the world a better place, I think_ ,” Riley said, glaring down at the guy, whose jaw dropped. “ _You, though…I don’t think you’re out to improve much of anything_.”

 

“I…I just…” the mugger trailed off, and Riley dropped to a landing in front of him, getting right into his face and appreciating the way he shrunk away, holding out the purse he’d been sifting through. “I-I’m sorry. I just…I didn’t know what else to do. I can’t get a job or nothin’, and I need money. I got kids, lady.”

 

“ _Then you should be setting a good example for them_ ,” Julie said in a chiding voice. “ _Step one is to stop being a mugger and a thief and do something constructive with your life_.”

 

The mugger looked between the two and sighed. He was about to say something else when a horrible screeching sound filled the alley, causing all three of them to look sharply in the direction of the source.

 

“ _Oh, holy shit_ ,” Julie said in shock, and Riley had to agree.

 

At the end of the alley, where it curved out of sight and led deeper between the two buildings, a metal monstrosity stood glaring at the mugger. Its head was mostly razor-sharp metal teeth and glowing yellow eyes, the body a mangled mass of metal limbs with intermittent patches of faux fur that probably once encased the whole endoskeleton. Its jaw opened wide, showing double rows of those jagged metal teeth.

 

“Skreeeeeeeeengh!” the creature screeched at them, lunging jerkily forward at the mugger, who screamed in a very undignified manner before hurrying toward the mouth of the alley and out of sight. Julie and Riley put themselves between the mugger and what had to be the Manhattan Mangle, which shakily made to brush past them, but Riley stuck out her hands and webbed its feet to the ground, causing it to overbalance and land its face. “Naaaargh!”

 

“ _Not much for words, is it_?” Julie asked nervously as the Mangle chopped at the webbing around its ankles, rounding on them. Its glowing yellow eyes shifted to red, twin beams glaring hatefully at them before it lunged forward. Riley webbed up its feet again, and it stumbled as its ankles were wrapped together, crashing to the ground of the alley. Riley leapt onto it and gripped one of its arms, tugging with all her might. The metal joints groaned until the arm popped away from the metal monster’s shoulder.

 

“ _I think people sometimes forget how strong the spiders make us_ ,” Riley observed, reaching for the other arm as the creature thrashed beneath her. “ _Julie, get the legs_.”

 

“ _So, we’re just dismembering it_?” Julie asked, landing nearby and reaching for the Mangle’s legs, yanking those away as well. Seconds later, the metal torso was thrashing fruitlessly against the pavement.

 

“What the hell’s going on back there!?” a voice yelled, and they looked up to see two police officers running up, the lead, a tall black man with a shaved head, gaping at the scene before reaching for his radio. “Aw, hell. Dispatch, this is car fourteen, we got a 10-34, requesting additional officers at Madison and Fifty-Third. Someone beat the hell outta that Mangle thing. Over.”

 

“ _Copy, car fourteen, backup units en-route_ ,” the radio squawked back. “ _Any suspects at the scene_?”

 

The cop fixed them with a hard gaze before saying, “Negative.”

 

“ _Time to go_ ,” Riley said, pulling Julie toward the wall and hopping up, scrambling to the rooftop.

 

“ _What the shit was that thing_?” Julie asked frantically as they hurried across the rooftop to put some distance between them and the crime scene.

 

“ _The Manhattan Mangle_ ,” Riley said, leaping over the side of the building and swinging down Madison Avenue. “ _I’ve never seen it in person, but that fit the bill_.”

 

“ _Okay, so what’s the Manhattan Mangle_?” Julie asked, swinging along beside her. “ _Like, what’s the story there_?”

 

“ _Well…that thing showed up out of nowhere a while ago, and it’s been sort of an urban myth_ ,” Riley explained. “ _We think it’s someone’s fucked up attempt to make like a robot hero. It’s obviously got some kind of sophisticated AI going on, because it can recognize criminal activity, but it’s like a town guard in Skyrim_.”

 

“ _Stole the sweet roll, pay with your life_ ,” Julie guessed.

 

“ _Pretty much_ ,” Riley said. “ _I’m glad we finally put it out of commission, but I’m more worried about who made it. Artificial Intelligence is a dangerous thing to just mess around with_.”

 

……

 

“So…we’re going to base an AI off an actual map of the human brain?” Jean asked, staring up at holo-screen. Tadashi nodded next to her, watching as a several holographic brains spun in place before them.

 

This was it. His favorite part. It was time to really get down to work, to stop postulating, speculating and hypothesizing and get down to the real nitty-gritty of Project Vision. He took a deep breath, glancing over to see Jean smiling at him like he’d just said something deeply amusing to her, a knowing little smirk spreading across his own face.

 

“Get out of my head,” he said in a wry tone, and Jean giggled sheepishly.

 

“I’m sorry, I swear I’m not in it,” she said, shaking her head and holding her hands up in a playfully defensive gesture. “But…I can sense the tone of a person’s brain without actually trying. And right now, you’re just so happy, it’s like…like Bobby, this kid back at school, when he gets a new video game and just can’t wait to play it. It’s…I dunno, it’s cute.”

 

“Jeez, then stay away from Fred,” Tadashi said with a little chuckle. “You’ll get the munchies just from being _near_ him.”

 

She laughed at that, smiling a toothy smile at Tadashi. “I’ll keep that in mind,” she said. “Um, so…how are we gonna do this?”

 

“Well, I’m thinking we hook someone up to Baymax and set up a live feed while they just…I dunno, experience emotions, sensory input,” he says. “I’m thinking we work out a VR setup where we can introduce control scenarios, and you can read the emotions while I map the area of the brain that’s experiencing the most activity. With luck, we’ll have a working template for the AI in…three months?”

 

“Three months?” Jean asked with an incredulous laugh. “That’s it?”

 

“Maybe longer,” Tadashi said with a grin. “Why, getting tired of me already?”

 

“Oh, heavens, no,” Jean said, folding her arms with a playfully petulant pout. “But ask me again in two weeks. Who knows how things might change.”

 

“Well, I’ll just have to be a gracious host and hope for the best,” Tadashi said with a wry smile. “In the meantime, we need to find a candidate to hook up to Baymax, someone who’s willing to work with us for a long-term setup. Any thoughts?”

 

“Actually,” Tony’s voice said from nearby, and they both turned as he strolled over from the elevator with a tablet in his hands, spinning a 3D render of some kind of new arc reactor before glancing up at the pair, “I might have a couple of suggestions, if I may.”

 

……

 

“Sir, a word, if I may?”

 

Oliver turned from his work, peering down at Hobie, who saw his own face reflected in the dark glasses Oliver always tended to wear when he worked. When Oliver said nothing but continued to gaze at him, Hobie figured he had the floor.

 

“Uh, NYPD just reported it,” Hobie said. “They got Subject Alpha. The uh, Manhattan Mangle?”

 

“What happened to it?” Oliver asked, his brow furrowing over his goggles.

 

“Well, they didn’t release any details,” Hobie said, “but…well, one of your science guys said it reported ‘catastrophic structural damage,’ they said. Sounds like someone beat the tar out of it.”

 

“No common man could have done more than scratch Subject Alpha,” Oliver grumbled, turning his gaze to a set of schematics, though he seemed lost in thought rather than consulting them, a hand coming up to rub at his chin. “As much of a relief as it is to have it out of my hair, it was a marvel of modern engineering, a testament to my genius. It must have run afoul of those meddlesome spiders.”

 

“What do we do?” Hobie asked. “I could get in touch with some people, have ‘em taken out?”

 

“No, no, we needn’t do anything so drastic,” Oliver said with a small shake of his head. “Not yet. They’re making no shortage of enemies. I daresay the local mobs will want a word with them before we need to get involved. It might just be what it takes to scare them off. For now, we continue our work and bide our time.”

 

“For how long?” Hobie asked, and Oliver turned back to him with a sinister smile.

 

“Patience,” he said. “When the time comes, the offensive will truly begin, and on that day, when the government’s house of cards topples, there will be no kings or masters, only men. On that day, Mr. Brown, the world will truly know justice.”

 

Hobie nodded, turning to leave. As the door opened with a pneumatic hiss to allow him to leave, Oliver spoke again.

 

“Oh, and Mr. Brown?” he said. Hobie paused and turned to him. “See to my daughter. Make sure she hasn’t been skipping any meals.”

 

Hobie rolled his eyes but nodded, heading away in the direction of the living quarters. If Oliver was unnerving to be around, his daughter was downright creepy. Between the megalomaniacal tendencies and a penchant for peals of cackling laughter, the two had well and truly crossed the line to full “supervillain and his weird daughter” territory. Still, he put up with it, because working for a supervillain was about the only way to get any real change done in this world. America had stagnated, the wheels of progress ground to a halt, and that meant something big had to come along and shake it to its very foundation.

 

Oliver Osnick, from the sound of things, was perfect for such a change.


	11. Chapter 11

“Alright, we’re rolling,” I say.

 

“Are you gonna say that _every_ time we use the camera?” Gwen asks from next to me, and I look over to see her smiling impishly up at me. I lean down and snag a little kiss, eliciting a tiny giggle.

 

“I am, and you can’t stop me,” I say. She just rolls her eyes but leans against me.

 

“My majestic dork in his natural habitat,” she says with a smile, kissing my cheek.

 

“Gwen, stop macking on your boyfriend and let him _film our epic odyssey_ ,” Harry says, pulling his new Wasp facemask on. It’s his Silver Surfer mask only painted crudely black and yellow like his new namesake. Because, apparently, Harry is the Wasp now, and MJ is the new Scorpion (name pending review by Neighborhood Watch).

 

Early this morning (ridiculously early; I got the call at eight o’clock), Harry texted, called, and eventually came knocking at the front door with Jubilee in tow, bursting into the basement and happening upon the rather awkward scene of Mary Jane and Gwen curled up on either side of me in bed. After a hasty explanation that Mary Jane had spent the night and had a nightmare at some point, we were treated to Harry explaining that he’d woken up feeling better than ever and found that he could once again stick to walls and lift a car with relative ease.

 

He’d actually gone into the Osborn car park and lifted his dad’s car over his head to test it out.

 

The news that the wasp and scorpion that had incapacitated our teammates may have actually also given them powers was…not as jarring as it probably should have been.

 

We’ve seen people get superpowers from some really weird places. Like Looter getting his from meteor fumes.

 

What’s up with that?

 

So, while Harry and Jubilee chattered away at Aunt May, who happily served them some waffles and gushed about how much fun she was having working at Oscorp, the three of us got ready for a day spent exploring the fact that Harry has a new set of superpowers and Mary Jane might have some of her own.

 

That was what brought us here, to the familiar rooftop that we first used to test out or ability to leap buildings in a single bound so long ago. Harry insisted that it had to be this building because it was “symbolic” or something. Now, the Neighborhood Watch (minus its X-Men members, who were due to arrive tomorrow to stay for an extended Summer visit) are gathered on the same rooftop. Even the new members, Riley’s protégés, are joining us.

 

Miles is alright, and his friend is kind of hilarious. Cindy’s a bit on the sassy side, but I like her. Julie is perfect in my book, since she’s had an awesome influence on Riley. Julie’s brother, Alex, is…well, I’m glad he’s only around on the weekends, having not made it into the school the others go to.

 

He’s kind of an ass.

 

“Peterrrrr,” MJ says in a singsong voice, trotting over and toppling into me with a hug. “You’ll catch me if I can’t jump that far, right?”

 

“Absolutely,” I say, and she giggles, kissing me on the nose, giving me a brief but intense whiff of bubble gum. “Sorry for dragging you up here just for a jump. This whole thing is just Harry being…Harry.”

 

“I know how that goes,” she mutters, pulling her new Jackpot mask into place. While Harry improvised somewhat crudely, MJ asked me to rig up one of my old masks with a HUD for her to use. It was a pretty quick job (I have about fourteen spare HUD lenses; those things break pretty easily in my line of work), but the mask looks fairly good, if I do say so myself. “ _So, I can’t stick to walls, but I have some pretty intense mega-strength, and we’re gonna find out if I can jump like you guys_.”

 

“That about sums it up,” I say, and she giggles a bit, leaning in and pulling her mask away from her mouth so her breath puffs over my skin with a whisper.

 

“If you catch me, I won’t get mad if you cop a feel,” she says, smirking as she pulls her mask back down, and I quickly yank my own mask over my face so no one can see the blush no doubt blooming on my cheeks.

 

“ _Don’t make me add a squirt bottle to my web-shooters_ ,” I warn her, and she cackles, hurrying to Harry’s side. “ _Alright, let’s do the run and jump, make this official, and then I’m gonna patrol with MJ and Gwen’s with Harry today so we can keep an eye out for whatever other powers they have_.”

 

“ _Make sure you watch me_ ,” MJ says in a singsong voice with a little wave back at me.

 

“ _Watch her butt in those tights, more like it_ ,” Gwen says into my ear with a little giggle. I snicker, and she shrugs, leaning against me. “ _I mean, it is a nice butt_.”

 

“ _Yours is nice, too_ ,” I insist, and she giggles, shaking against me.

 

“ _Aw, thanks_ ,” she says. “ _See?_ _No comparisons, just five butts to compliment_.”

 

“ _Five_?” I ask with a short look at her, and she gasps softly.

 

“ _Four_ ,” she hastily corrects herself. “ _Definitely totally four. Not five_.”

 

“ _Gwen…_ ” I begin, and she shakes her head.

 

“ _Not now_ ,” she says softly. “ _Just…let’s be here for Harry and MJ. You trust me, don’t you? When have my little schemes ever turned out anything but good for you_?”

 

I just roll my eyes behind my mask. “ _You always know how to turn an argument to shut me up_ ,” I tell her, and she smirks.

 

“ _Damn right_ ,” she says. “ _I’m the OG, the Original Girlfriend_.”

 

“ _If you actually start referring to yourself like that, we’re gonna have a problem_ ,” I say, and she bursts into laughter, wrapping her arms around me as we watch Harry shift his weight from foot to foot, readying himself.

 

“ _I’m the Wasp!_ ” he yells. “ _I’m gonna fuckin’ jump this gap_!”

 

“ _Fuck that gap up_!” I cheer him, and Harry clenches his fists at his sides, tearing for the side of the building. He’s fast, faster than he was when he was the Tarantula, and as he leaps across the gap, I can almost barely track his progress before he’s skidding to a halt on the other side, pumping his fists triumphantly.

 

“ _Dude_!” he says over my earpiece, waving his arms. “ _Dude, I jumped like crazy fast! I’m faster than when I was before_!”

 

“ _Saw it_ ,” I tell him. “ _You tore that gap a new gap_.”

 

“ _Fuck yeah, boy_!” Harry shouted, his voice triggering an automatic lowering of the volume in my earpiece. I turn to MJ, and she sways her hips a bit, a soft giggle sounding out of her mask.

 

“ _Ready to catch me, Spider-Man_?” she asks in a voice that I can only describe as enticing, and oh Mary Jane, you’re making it so difficult to keep this whole polyamory thing under wraps, but you’re so adorable. I just nod, and she holds out a hand toward me before lowering it and turning toward the edge of the building.

 

“ _Right here, MJ_ ,” I say to her, and she snickers over my earpiece.

 

“ _Promise_?” she asks.

 

“ _I shanghaied an X-Man into dragging you out of coma_ ,” I say, “ _I’m not letting you become street-pizza_.”

 

She lets a soft giggle, and all of the outside sound drowns out as she opens up a private channel.

 

“ _I love you_ ,” she whispers into my ear, and I smile behind my mask.

 

“ _Love you too_ ,” I tell her, and she does a little jig in place before tearing toward the edge of roof. She’s not as fast as Harry, closer to his speed from before, when he first got his powers with Gwen and me. She jumps off the rooftop, and I take an involuntary step forward as she sails across the gap, looking in danger of not quite making it. I’m just ready to hop over the side and catch her when she lands on the other rooftop, a scant few yards from the edge. She turns and lets a breathy laugh into my earpiece.

 

“ _Holy shit, I did it_!” she shouts jubilantly. “ _I totally just…. I just jumped across the entire fucking street_!”

 

“ _And looked awesome while you did it_ ,” I tell her, and she giggles happily, skipping over to hug Harry.

 

“ _We’re superpowered_!” she giggles, and Harry laughs right back, picking her up and spinning her once before setting her back down again.

 

“ _We are so totally the Wasp and the Scorpion_!” he says with a joyous laugh, prompting a snort from Mary Jane.

 

“ _I don’t know if I wanna inherit my superhero name from a juiced-up Mexican drug lord_ ,” she says. “ _Can I just still be Jackpot but with scorpion powers and web-shooters_?”

 

“ _Absolutely_ ,” I say. “ _Alright, everyone group up, and let’s get going_.”

 

……

 

“It’s nice to just go somewhere instead of staying all cooped up in that place,” Jubilee said as she strolled along next to Lana, who nodded, taking a small mouthful of her soft-serve ice cream, which was rapidly melting under the summer heat.

 

“Yeah, but outside has a habit of reminding you how lucky we are as a society to have air conditioning,” Lana grumbled, and Jubilee snorted.

 

“Girl, this is nothing compared to – “

 

“Yeah, yeah, California is soooo hot and sunny and amazing with white sandy beaches and palm trees and stuff,” Lana said with a roll of her eyes and a half smile. “You only mention it like a billion times a day.”

 

“Well I’m sorry I’m from the land of amazing beaches, epic movies, and sexy bikini bitches,” Jubilee said with a snort. “I guess New Yorkers and Californians are doomed to always think their home is the best.”

 

“Hey, at least we’re not from Ohio,” Lana said, and Jubilee nodded solemnly.

 

“Poor Jess,” she said. “I couldn’t stand five minutes in that place.”

 

“You’ve been?” Lana asked.

 

“On our little road trip back,” Jubilee said. “We stopped through some place called…Rooster or Booster or something. It was beautiful for four minutes.”

 

“Ew,” Lana said with a chuckle, looking around at the street. “Anyway, shouldn’t we be there by now?”

 

“I mean, there’s _supposed_ to be an Applebee’s around here,” Jubilee said, and Lana glanced over at her incredulously.

 

“You’re not even _sure_?” she asked. Jubilee turned back with a quirked eyebrow. “You should probably at least know where this place is before just heading out on a hot summer day to drag me through the streets.”

 

“Yeah, because I totally didn’t just have my ass dragged across the entire country to a completely unfamiliar city with the population of a small nation,” she said, rolling her eyes. “You’re the New Yorker, can’t you just use your magical New Yorker powers to hail a taxi, get in, just tell the Indian guy ‘Fugeddaboutit’, and wham-boom, you’re at like a kosher deli or a Yankees game or the Statue of Liberty?”

 

“Right, if anyone’s a walking stereotype, it’s totally me, Miss Nineties with your twee little short-do and bubblegum, right?” Lana said. “Don’t you have a pop video to film with Len or Brandy?”

 

Without even noticing, the pair had wandered down a small side street that was really more of an alley between two larger streets. The sidewalk wasn’t quite as well-kept, and the stores were mostly smaller secondhand places and pawn shops.

 

It was not the best place for two high school girls to be wandering alone.

 

“Hey, Norton, get a loada this,” a voice said, and Lana saw some generic street thug in a tank-top and cargo shorts (ew, cargo shorts) stubbing out a cigarette against the wall before making his way toward them, four of his pals behind him. “Couple’a girls just wandering right into our little patch of paradise.”

 

“I’ve told you, I’m calling myself Looter now,” the one called Norton said. He had short brown hair and a goatee, and Lana noticed he was wearing some kind of homemade supervillain suit that was really just a bunch of layered Under Armor in shades of silver and black.

 

“Okay, but that’s a stupid name,” Cargo Shorts said. “I mean, at least call yourself something like…Meteor Man, right? You got your powers from that meteor, so that makes sense. You don’t even loot anything, you just do your weird kidnapping thing.”

 

“Ugh! Let’s just get them,” Looter said, and the men fanned out, surrounding the pair.

 

“He said something about kidnapping,” Jubilee said.

 

“I’d rather not be kidnapped,” Lana said. “Um…plans?”

 

“Can you do your explodey thing?” Jubilee asked.

 

“I have a damn good reason to try,” Lana told her. “You?”

 

“I mean, I can do some gymnastics stuff and kick a few faces, but that’s about it,” Jubiliee said. “Call the Watch?”

 

“I don’t think they’re just gonna let us make a phone call,” Lana said, glaring around at the thugs, who were watching their exchange with evident amusement. “It looks like we’re on our own. But I’m am _so_ not getting kidnapped and made into some pedo’s daydream.”

 

“I resent that – “

 

“You shut the _fuck_ up!” Lana said. This was the second time in a month that she’d found herself being targeted by common street thugs for some kind of heinous kidnap attempt. What was with criminals and this obsession with jailbait?

 

Gross

Holding her hands out, all of the latent rage, all of the resentment she’d been feeling toward…just about everything surged forth, and the sheer force of the emotion broke through whatever weird mental block her mother’s absence had had on her powers.

 

For real, why should her mom make her life even more miserable by _not_ being around? Why couldn’t she have the best of both worlds.

 

 

_Whump-BOOM!_

 

The ground at Looter’s feet exploded, showering them with shrapnel, and two of the thugs immediately turned tail and ran, the rest staring at Lana in shock.

 

“Bombshell is so fucking _back_ , dickweeds,” Lana said, thrusting her hands out and cackling as another explosion tore up the street under the thugs’ ratty old shoes. “You can beg, but I won’t listen.”

 

……

 

“Would you just listen to me?”

 

“I’ve listened to you _quite enough_ , Tony Stark!” Carol said, frowning at him. “I’ve listened to you snark off all of my attempts at apologizing, and I’ve listened to you just oh-so-casually try make me feel like the guiltiest piece of shit in the world. Well, guess what? _Now_ I don’t have to keep up a professional front, and I can just say to you, _without_ jeopardizing a world-saving mission, that you are an absolute narcissistic pig, and I was a fool to ever think I was in love with you!”

 

“Ah, but you thought – “

 

“Don’t you even dare!” she shouted at him.

 

“Carol, I’m _sorry_ ,” Tony said.

 

Oh, that brought her up short, and Tony knew it would. He never apologized. Even when he knew he was in the wrong, Tony Stark never apologized. He made things right, he admitted that he might have been wrong, but the words “I’m sorry” hadn’t passed his lips since he was a child, saying them to his mother for using her credit card to buy the entire stock of a candy shop.

 

He still had some twenty-year-old malted milk balls around here somewhere.

 

The fact was, Tony was apologizing, and worst of all, he _meant_ it. He’d originally suggested Carol Danvers as a candidate for Project Vision as a joke, a move he hadn’t been ready to admit that he’d intended to bring her back into his life however possible. But now, here she was, accepting the olive branch, and Tony was trying desperately to keep her here.

 

Because, as much as hated to admit it, Carol made him feel like a somewhat normally-functioning human being, and he hated how much he liked that.

 

“I’m gonna need you to repeat that,” Carol said flatly.

 

“I’m…. I’m sorry,” Tony said. “That’s how serious I am right now. And you know me, I’m – “

 

“Never serious,” Carol said with a beady look at him. “Keep talking.”

 

Tony sighed, looking around. “Jarvis, give us the room,” he said.

 

“ _Entrance to the lab is now blocked, barring unforeseen world-changing circumstance_ ,” Jarvis said. “ _Security cameras are non-operational, and all internal recording devices are deactivated_.”

 

“People leave me,” Tony said, spitting out the words. “They read the Rolling Stone articles, the Newsweek pieces, the Popular Mechanics blurbs, and they get…ideas about me. And then they meet me, and I’m not what they thought, I’m….”

 

“A neurotic mess with Daddy issues,” Carol said flatly, and Tony gestured at her.

 

“See, you get it,” he said. “I liked you. We drank, we had fun, we bonded, and then….”

 

“You found out I was a SHIELD mole, and…trust issues,” Carol said with a sigh. “But…c’mon, Tony, I told you, even if I wasn’t totally honest, what we had was genuine.”

 

“I am…absolutely terrified of commitment,” Tony said, not looking at her, just staring out the window. “I’ve…had more than a little time for some self-reflection, and I’ve realized that the moment any kind of stability presents itself…or herself…I tend to panic and shove it out of my life at the first possible opportunity.”

 

“And finding out that the woman you…like a bit…was a mole for _the_ government coalition of superspies was quite an opportunity,” Carol said in a thoughtful tone. “Tony….”

 

“Let’s not get weepy,” Tony said. “In what I’ll admit is a rare moment of lucidity, I suggested you as a candidate for this Project Vision because…it would bring you back. I was…happy. I was the happiest I can remember being. Because of you. And it pains me to admit this, but I’m willing to admit it. I miss you. But I don’t want any more secrets.”

 

“I need to have a few secrets,” Carol said with a small smile. “But if they involve you…I think I can let you know.”

 

“I can work with that,” Tony said, nodding at her, and Carol let a small laugh, stepping closer to him.

 

“I think I like real-talk Tony Stark,” she said, and Tony scoffed, rolling his eyes.

 

“Don’t get used to it,” he said. “I think I do real-talk once every…five or six years. Last time was…well, let’s not get into last time, and just be glad you got a round all to yourself. Carol Danvers, I happen to really enjoy your company in my day-to-day life, and I’d prefer to keep it, so I’m hoping we can just call this whole thing even and start again from here.”

 

Carol just smirked at him, shrugging. “Well…I suppose we can do that.”

 

They stared at each other for a long moment before the holo-display gave a short, distressed chirp, and Tony’s head jerked for the source.

 

“ _Distress beacon automatically triggered_ ,” Jarvis’s cool voice came. “ _Unconfirmed local reports of a disturbance in the immediate proximity of Lana Baumgartner and Jubilation Lee. Attempts at contact unsuccessful. Chameleon bot intervention is recommended_.”

 

“Parker’s friends?” Carol asked, smiling fondly at the console as Tony rushed over to it. “I’ve missed that kid. He keeps things exciting.”

 

……

 

“I think I’ve had enough excitement in my life,” Lana said, holding an arm out as a thug lunged toward Jubilee, and he backed off. “Don’t you fucking dare. I can tolerate this girl for more than five minutes, you don’t get her.”

 

“Aw, that’s the sweetest thing you’ve ever about to me,” Jubilee said. Around them, explosions had left the street pockmarked, some of them still smoking. Most of the smarter thugs had run off, but the guy called Looter and his talkative friend Cargo Shorts were still there, leering at them. Cargo Shorts reached into a pocket and drew out a handful of blue pills, popping them into his mouth and swallowing.

 

“I have a bad feeling about this,” Jubilee muttered, and Lana snorted.

 

“Alright, Obi-Wan,” she said. “Just stay close to me, okay?”

 

“What do you think I’ve _been_ doing?” Jubilee snarked at her, and Lana just rolled her eyes. Looter glanced over at Cargo Shorts, who was breathing heavily through his nose, growling noises sounding in his throat.

 

“Aaaagh, let’s fucking _do this_!” he said, and he tore toward the pair faster than Lana could track. Suddenly, he was right in front of Lana, and she felt all of the air leave her lungs as he delivered a solid punch to her stomach, sending her sprawling onto the ground.

 

“MGH,” Jubilee said. “You junkie fu—AGH!”

 

She was cut off, coughing as Cargo Shorts gripped her throat, lifting her from the ground.

 

“Let her go, you fucking – “

 

“Don’t forget about me,” Looter’s voice came, and Lana just had time to leap out of the way as he swung at her. “You girls are coming with us, and I don’t wanna – “

 

_Paf-BWOOM!_

 

Lana was rolled away by a wave of heat, and she sat up, her ears ringing a bit, to see Jubilee sitting there, staring at her hand in open awe.

 

“Holy shit!” she said, looking dumbstruck at Lana, who just shrugged.

 

“Question it later!” she said, climbing to her feet. “Assholes!”

 

The two men stared at them with wide eyes, suddenly not nearly as confident. Climbing to their feet, they turned and started to run, but the two girls had other designs for them.

 

“Oh no you don’t,” Jubilee said, holding her hand out, and a blue streak of light flew from her hand with that same soft “ _paf_ ” sound.

 

_BWOOM!_

 

Looter and Cargo Pants were tossed off their feet, rolling and slumping to the ground, the fight gone from them. Looter might have even been unconscious.

 

Lana didn’t really care.

 

“Holy shit,” Jubilee said again, looking up at Lana, aghast. “Okay, so shoot glowing balls of light that can just…explode when I want them to.”

 

“Seen weirder,” Lana said, hurrying over and taking her wrist, dragging her away from the scene. “C’mon, we should get going before this gets – “

 

“Even more fucked up?” a new voice said, and Lana wheeled around to see two guys and –

 

“Kitty!?” she said, and Kitty grinned at her, skipping over to wrap her in a hug that Lana tentatively returned.

 

She wasn’t much of a hugger.

 

“Hey Lana, hey Jubilee!” she said, smiling at both of them. “I didn’t know it was you guys we were getting!”

 

“Well…us either,” Lana said, glancing from Kitty to the two boys accompanying her. One was tall and stocky, with arms and legs as thick as tree trunks. The other was only a few inches shorter and thin but muscular, built actually very similar to Peter, like he’d come into his muscles only recently. He wore a red visor over his eyes, leaving only his mouth visible.

 

“Oh my stars and garters,” the thickset boy said, glancing around. His eyes were wide in awe, and that, combined with his baby face, made him look like a large child that had just seen his first game of peekaboo. “This street looks like a minefield.”

 

“Well, my explodey powers just came back,” Lana explained. “And Jubilee can make glowy disco orbs that blow up, I guess.”

 

“Which is totally epic, and I like never use that word,” Jubilee said. “Wait, are we mutants?”

 

“You certainly are,” Kitty said to her. “And Lana, you’re…sort of one. Why don’t we take you back to the X-Mansion and – “

 

_Thwip-thwip!_

 

“ _What the hell happened_!?” a familiar modulated voice yelled. “ _Are you guys—Kitty_!?”

 

“Pe-uh…Spider-Man, calm down,” Kitty said, smiling up at Peter, who crawled down with Mary Jane in tow on her Jackpot legs. “Everything’s fine, but…um, these two girls are mutants, and we’re taking them back to the X-Mansion.”

 

Peter seemed to realize that Spider-Man should have no idea who these two random girls were (and honestly, it was a bit of a stretch that he knew Kitty Pryde), shaking his head and dropping to a landing as sirens sounded in the distance. The police were closing in, and Lana just could not deal with the cops, given that she was a reforming super-criminal and her mother was in jail for a long, long time.

 

It was time to break out the girlfriend card.

 

“Spider-Man,” she said, hurrying forward and staring up into Peter’s glowing blue lenses. “Everything’s fine. My friend and I are gonna go with the X-Men, and then we’ll be right back to our normal lives, okay?”

 

Peter huffed through his mask, folding his arms, and Lana could just imagine that ridiculously adorable pouty expression he got sometimes.

 

“ _C’mon, Spidey_ ,” Mary Jane said, coming up behind him and wrapping him in a hug. “ _They’ll be back. Don’t you trust Kitty Pryde_?”

 

Lana glanced behind her and saw Kitty looking more amused than anything. Of course Pete trusted Kitty; he trusted all of the X-Men. But Pete was a worrier, and right now one of his girlfriends and his best friend’s girlfriend had been involved in a scuffle that he’d only arrived at after the fact. He probably didn’t want to let them out of his sight. When Pete continued to shift his stance in obvious agitation, Lana sighed, rolling her eyes and stepping forward to whisper in his ear.

 

“The sooner we get out of here, the sooner I can get back to my _boyfriend_ , who I’d very much like to play some little spoon with,” she said softly, giggling when Pete visibly stiffened, coughing and shoving her gently toward Kitty.

 

“ _Move along, citizen_ ,” he said, and Lana snorted when she heard Mary Jane cackling as they climbed back up the side of the nearest building.

 

Boys were too easy sometimes.

 

……

 

I hate how easy it is for these girls to mess with me sometimes.

 

I can’t help it if I worry about them, especially Lana, though it looks like she has her powers back, somehow. And Jubilee is a mutant? I guess technically they’re both mutants, and Lana finally managed to unlock her powers without her mom around.

 

Does this mean they’re joining the X-Men with Jess and Kitty and the others? That…I’m not sure I like that. Okay, it would certainly be best to have two short-tempered girls with the power to generate explosive force at will in a place that will train them to not blow things up on accident, but…I’d miss them. I already miss Jess, and…well, Kitty’s a lot of fun to be around, and I certainly look forward to the weekends in large part because of those two. Adding Lana and Jubilee to that arrangement would be a little jarring.

 

It’s shallow reasoning, but I don’t care!

 

“ _Hear that?_ ” MJ says as I land on a rooftop, hearing her stumble to a landing behind me. She has the reflexes for web-swinging, but it takes a bit of practice to work out how to do it in style.

 

It’s sort of adorable, watching her learn the ropes. Or…the webs.

 

I listen for whatever she’s picking up on, and soon I hear it. It’s not an alarm or police sirens or anything. Rather, it’s a low, panicked murmur, interspersed with shocked screams. It’s the rare sound of a situation blossoming right under our feet, before the phone calls, the panicked Tweets, the phone calls.

 

“ _Let’s move_ ,” I say, leaping over the side of the building and swinging down to crawl along the wall, MJ’s Jackpot legs carrying her along behind me.

 

The scene waiting for us is nothing we haven’t defused before. A man with a shaved head and some kind of bullseye tattoo on his forehead has a woman at gunpoint, smirking up at us.

 

“There’s the man himself!” he says. “The Spider-Man! Who’s the girl?”  


“ _Jackpot_ ,” Mary Jane says. “ _And you need to let that woman go now_.”

 

He smirks, shoving the woman aside and raising his gun, setting my spider-sense clanging. “That’s fine,” he says. “I only need one shot.”

 

He fires, and instinctively, I leap aside, hearing the bullet rip into the brick wall behind me, rather alarmingly close. MJ tears forward, fingers curled into claws, and jabs two fingers into the Bullseye guy’s shoulder.

 

“Ah!” he shouts out, staggering back. “How did you – I never miss….” He staggers a bit, slumping against a table and flopping to the ground.

 

“ _Oh God, did I kill him_?” MJ squeaks out, and I hurry forward.

 

“ _Athena, lifesigns_?” I ask.

 

“ _Life-signs are—stable_ ,” Athena said. “ _Subject is—unconscious but vital_.”

 

“ _You knocked him out_ ,” I say, and I hear her sigh with relief. “ _But…how did you do that_?”

 

“ _It felt like…I dunno these little spikey things came out of my fingertips, and there was this…weird wishy-wash feeling, and then he was sleeping_ ,” MJ says, and I just laugh.

 

“ _I’ll be sure to make a note of the ‘wishy-wash feeling’_ ,” I tell her, and she huffs.

 

“ _Oh, shut up_ ,” she pouts before freezing and letting a small gasp at something she sees over my shoulder. “ _Oh, no way_.”

 

I turn around, and I truly, finally understand what it really means when people talk about worlds colliding. I thought I had experienced the phenomenon before, but it wouldn’t be the first time I’ve overestimated just how crazy my life can get. Because I’m seeing someone I never expected to interact with in costume.

 

“Spider-Man,” Aunt May says, smiling at the pair of us. “Well, this is a treat.”

 

“ _Um…are you alright, Miss_?” I ask fumblingly, and Aunt May smiles, glancing over to where the woman we saved is being comforted by a couple of others.

 

“I think Alison is a bit rattled, but I bet you have yourself another fan after today,” Aunt May says with a small chuckle. “Spider-Man, right here. Goodness, Peter will love to hear this.”

 

“ _Peter is your…son_?” I ask, extra-glad for my voice modulator. Aunt May would probably recognize me immediately, even without seeing my face. I may call her Aunt May, but she’s basically Mom.

 

“Yes, he is,” Aunt May says, and I grin beneath my mask, feeling my face heat up at the fondness in her voice. “He’d get such a hoot out of his old Aunt May meeting a superhero. I guess I’m the cool mom now, huh?”

 

“ _The coolest mom_ ,” I say with a small laugh. “ _He’ll be taking notes on how to be as cool as you_.”

 

Aunt May just chuckles, peering searchingly at me. The silence drags on for _just_ a bit too long when, surprise, more sirens sound in the distance.

 

Those seem to follow me around the city, I swear.

 

“Well, you should be heading along before the police get you mixed up in their business,” Aunt May says, and I chuckle.

 

“ _Are you sure you’re not a retired superhero yourself_?” I ask. She just gives me a smile, quirking an eyebrow.

 

“Well if I was, I would sure never tell,” she says, prompting another laugh from me as I head over and hop onto the wall. “Be safe out there, Spider-Man.”

 

“ _Oh, I’m safe_ ,” I tell her. “ _It’s just, everyone else is doing really dangerous stuff, and I get all mixed up in it_.”

 

“You keep telling yourself that,” Aunt May says, and I clamber up the side of the building.

 

“ _Um…Pete, I don’t really know Aunt May_ that _well, but it felt like she was just talking to you like you were you and not…you know, Spider-Man_ ,” MJ says as we reach the rooftop.

 

“ _That’s a can of worms I’m just not ready to even touch right now_ ,” I insist as a faint buzz starts filling my brain in the most unnerving way. “ _Do you feel that_?”

 

“ _Nope_ ,” MJ says. “ _I don’t think I have a scorpion-sense or anything_.”

 

“ _Sucks to be you_ ,” I say, and she gently smacks my arm. “ _It’s coming from…there…oh…._ ”

 

I gesture in the general direction of Greenwich Village, where storm clouds seem to be gathering above a particular block in the area, crackling with red lightning.

 

Lightning isn’t usually red.

 

“ _Should we put out a call_?” MJ asks, and I just nod.

 

“ _Neighborhood Watch, who’s free_?” I ask into my mouthpiece, and a couple of voices sound back.

 

“ _I’ve got nothing going on_ ,” Cindy says.

 

“ _We’re not doing anything_ ,” Gwen says. “ _Are you okay, Pete_?”

 

“ _Something shifty’s going on in Greenwich Village_ ,” I say. “ _You guys assemble on my location_.”

 

“ _What’s happening_?” MJ asks, stepping close and hugging me around the waist.

 

“ _Probably something way over our heads that we’re gonna have to deal with anyway_ ,” I grumble, and MJ sighs, squeezing me in a hug.

 

“ _It’s nothing we can’t handle, though_ ,” she says.

 

I wish I could believe that.

 

……

 

Illyana was ready to believe a lot of things.

 

When she’d found out that her beloved older brother was a mutant with the power to change his body into a nigh-unbreakable metal at will, she’d been…disbelieving at first. But then he’d demonstrated his powers to her, and she’d accepted that mutants were just a part of the world. They were something that happened. It was explainable by simple quirks in DNA, genomes, stuff she would probably learn about later in life.

 

However, when she’d later been taken from her world and stranded in a place that she would eventually find out was called Limbo, she’d realized that mutants were just the tip of a monumental iceberg. She couldn’t tell how long she’d wandered for in this place between worlds. It felt like years and seconds at the same time, and she had been able feel her mind growing, expanding as her body matured. This place had seemed to grow with her, feeding off of her physical form and sending her visions of what a girl her age was supposed to experience, taunting her with the knowledge. At one point, a grown-up man had found her, smiling at her in a way that was probably supposed to be charming but was ultimately altogether too creepy. He’d introduced himself as Belasco and chatted with her for a few moments before he had admitted that it was he who had brought her to Limbo, intending to take her as a student and eventually his wife. He had then confessed his love for her, proposing to her on the spot and promising that he would make her a Queen. Illyana had been warned off of overly-interested men long ago by Piotr, who had always said that any grown man who tried to treat her like a grown woman was bad and not to be trusted. Ultimately, she’d managed to give him the slip, running and suddenly finding herself in a completely different part of this strange world, like something had carried her there faster than a blink.

 

While she’d wandered, she’d found two strange women, known only as Storm and Cat, who’d helped her navigate her way through this unusual world. Over what had felt like years, they’d taught her as best as they could, telling her that Piotr was special, but so was she. She had a power just like he did, but hers was very different. She could transport herself across space, even across time if she practiced enough, and that was how she’d gotten away from Belasco. In addition to her inborn powers, Storm taught her the ways of sorcery, of how to manipulate the latent energies surrounding all things to help, to heal, to fend off the darkness and to preserve the light.

 

By the time she truly had a handle on what Cat called her “mutant powers” of teleportation, she was also a rather accomplished sorceress, to the point that creatures across this land called Limbo shrank away and ran from her in fright when they found at that she was Illyana Rasputin. They’d even coined a name for her, Magik, after what they believed to be the source of her powers. Several years after her initial arrival in this land, she found herself powerful enough that even Storm had admitted there was no more she could teach her, that she was truly a sorceress.

 

This had all come to a head when had Belasco had found her again, snarling at her, calling her a usurper, claiming the Limbo belonged to him and that she had no business stepping in on his “throne”, as he had called it. She had been meant to submit to him, not overthrow him. Illyana had only told him one thing.

 

“You picked the wrong girl, then.”

 

The battle that had ensued was one that had apparently stretched for days, across the entire realm. Belasco had been powerful, but Illyana had what Storm had called a “strong spirit”, and that apparently got one far in the extra-dimensional magic game.

 

In the end, the only one left alive had been Illyana, Storm and Cat having sacrificed themselves to separate Belasco from an amulet that had been giving him a power boost. Without it, the would-be king had fallen easily. As Illyana stood over the body of her fallen kidnapper, mourning the loss of the only two friends she’d had for what felt like an eternity, she had felt it. A pull. The loss of its ruler had shaken something in Limbo, leaving the realm shuddering in the wake of Belasco’s death.    


Tapping into her other power, her teleportation ability, she’d stepped onto one of her Disks, intending only to take herself to another area of Limbo. What she hadn’t expected was the rather sudden spike in magic that had burst forth from the amulet she’d received in the fight, boosting her teleportation power and sending her flying through the Ether itself –

 

To a place that felt…familiar but Strange with a capital “S”.

 

“What…what are you doing here, girl?” a voice asked as she was suddenly standing in a high-ceilinged room lined with dark wood panels and Victorian-style décor, complete with dark red rugs and floor-to-ceiling bookcases stacked with tomes she couldn’t hope to identify. “I was reaching out to Limbo, and you popped in here.”

 

“Where even _is_ here?” she asked in halting, stumbling English. It seemed like so long ago that Charles Xavier had placed a hand to her head and imbued her with the knowledge of how to speak and understand the language, knowledge that had spent what felt like years neglected in a world where words and thoughts seemed to be one and the same.

 

“You’re on Earth, child,” the voice said, and all at once, things coalesced in Illyana’s vision. The room around her fully materialized, revealing a man standing in front of her wearing a fairly elaborate red cape of sorts over a dark blue outfit. He had close-cropped black hair and a neatly trimmed beard-goatee combo. “How you came to be here and why you weren’t here in the first place is something we can discuss later. For now, please stay where you are while I attend to this intruder.”

 

Illyana was only happy to agree, watching as this strange man squared off with an equally strange foe using forces she recognized as those similar to the ones she’d employed during her time in Limbo. The energies were vastly weakened, expending most of their power making the trip to Earth, but the battle was no less impressive. Illyana could never hope to drag such formidable power to this world. Sure, she could wield it back in Limbo, but it would be significantly diminished here.

 

Here.

 

Home.

 

She was home.

 

What did home even mean? It seemed like years that she’d been gone. Her mind and body had undergone such significant changes that it felt like she was a completely different person than when she’d left.

 

Was Piotr looking for her? Had he given up? She remembered him hanging onto her for dear life as she’d been pulled away from this realm. It felt like so long ago.

 

“What is your name, intruder?” the caped man said, and Illyana followed his gaze to see another man, also in a cape (were capes back in fashion?) staring back. Or he might have been. He was wearing an elaborate suit of metal armor, complete with a facemask with eyes aglow with yellow energy.

 

“My name matters not,” he said. “All that matters, Stephen Strange, is that this building is the focal point of powerful mystical energies that I would use to take back my homeland. You can help me, in which case you will be rewarded, or you can attempt to stop me, and you will fail.”  


“That’s quite an assumption,” Stephen Strange said. “But, my friend, bravado is only useful if you have the power to back it up. And I can tell, you are, at best, a novice. This…unusual young lady could probably hand you on her own.”

 

“You would belittle me?” the armored man said, holding his arms out.

 

“Please, girl, stand back!” the caped man shouted, and Illyana jerked away as a surge of energy coalesced into a bolt and shot past her, blasting a few books into cinders and ashes. The caped man seemed to be squaring off with another man in metal armor and a long hooded green cloak.

 

“Fool!” the green-cloaked man shouted. “It doesn’t matter what sort of hellish demons you call forth! You’re no match for the might of Doom!”  


“I don’t suppose you know anything in the way of magic, stranger?” the red-caped man asked Illyana, and she smirked.

 

“Where I’m from, Magik is literally my name,” she said, holding her hands out. She felt the faint energies of Limbo drawn from the distant realm through her hands, joining forces with whatever Strange energies this man controlled, powering forth and colliding with Doom’s paltry magic. He had a respectable understanding of extra-dimensional energies, for a man of Earth, but Illyana hadn’t spent her formative years fighting for life while gaining her own knowledge of the true energies of the worlds for nothing. This Doom fellow was no match for the pair’s combined might.

 

“Nagh!” Doom shouted, sprawling out on his back. “No! I must take back my land! You cannot stop me from reclaiming my – “

 

His words were cut off as Illyana sensed a wormhole opening beneath him. Her presence here had apparently shifted some kind of cosmic balance, and Doom had been in the perfect place to set things right, to balance the books as it were. Limbo apparently needed a mortal to wander its vast, endless plains, but that mortal didn’t need to be Illyana, it seemed. As she watched the wormhole began to spiral, Doom and his green cloak dissolving and spinning into a blurred vortex of colors before plummeting down into oblivion. Even as he disappeared, Illyana felt her own presence on this plane solidifying, like she was waking up from a long and terrible dream.

 

She was, truly, back.

 

“ _Um…_ ”  a strange-sounding voice said, and Illyana and her unknowing rescuer looked up to see a boy in a skintight bodysuit staring down at them from a mask with glowing blue eyes, peering through a tall window. “ _Please tell me I didn’t miss out on_ two _fights in one day_.”

 

“I…well, I’m sorry,” her new friend said with a small smile, “but…that seems to be exactly the case, Spider-Man.”

 

“ _Damn iiiiit_ ,” Spider-Man said, slumping visibly. “ _Well, at least tell me this ended in a best-case scenario. Right_?”

 

Illyana stared up at him, daring to hope for the first time in a confusing muddle of years, it seemed.

 

“The _very_ best,” she insisted with a bright smile up at the boy.

 

……

 

“This is the best thing that could have happened,” Lana insisted. “Like…I can’t think of one thing wrong with this whole situation.”

 

“I’d love to come up with a sassy retort, but I just can’t,” Jubilee agreed, strolling along next to her as Kitty lead them on a little tour of the grounds before they were to meet Professor X, who was apparently taking a phone call from someone.

 

The idea of one of the most powerful mutants ever and the unofficial leader of the mutants of the world taking a phone call was actually amusing.

 

“Lana, Jubilee, hey!” a voice said excitedly, and Lana turned to find herself being engulfed in a hug (too many hugs in one day) from Jess, who hopped away and immediately spun to wrap Jubilee in an embrace as well. “This is so wild!”

 

“I know, right?” Jubilee said, holding out her hand. Two tiny glowing orbs emerged, one pink and one blue. They spun in place before bursting in a little light show. “I can do that times about two-hundred, too.”

 

“Yeah, way to upstage _my_ power,” Lana said, huffing a bit, and Jess rolled her eyes, bumping Lana with her shoulder.

 

“Aw, I bet we find out something really awesome you can do with yours,” she said. “Hank McCoy’s really good with biology stuff like that, and they have this crazy-advanced tech that can like read the energies your explosions give off. We figure out what you’re actually putting out, we can help you refine your powers and stuff.”

 

“Wow, you really bought into this whole X-Man thing,” Lana muttered, and Jess shrugged, stopping near some trees.

 

“I mean…powers can be dangerous,” she says. “Even the ones that are a bit more subtle. Kitty has to be careful she doesn’t phase through the wrong thing and knock out electricity to the whole city or bring down our computer networks. Flash has to watch out when he’s full Electro mode, or his voltage could kill someone. And…well, I don’t need to tell you how dangerous fire is.”

 

She shrugged again, glancing at Kitty, who just smiled and skipped over to hug her.

 

“Still not mad about the thing with your hair?” Jess asked, and Kitty just smirked.

 

“It needed cut anyway,” she said. “Besides, remember when I bricked your laptop?”

 

“I cried,” Jess said with a rueful smile. “Thank God you salvaged it.”

 

Thundering footsteps cut off Kitty’s reply, and she turned to the source, the four of them seeing a large man dashing toward them.

 

“Peter, what’s going on?” Kitty asked. “What’s wrong?”

 

“Katya, she is back!” Peter (that was gonna get confusing if Peter Parker ever showed up) said in a strong Russian accent, stopping for just a moment and bouncing with energy. “Illyana is back! She has returned.”

 

“Oh my God…” Kitty asked, her eyes widening in shock, mouth falling open. “How – “

 

“Come!” Peter said, taking her arm and dragging her along. “She weel want to see you!”

 

“Peter, I – agh!” Kitty was apparently not running fast enough for Peter, who simply scooped her up and slung her over her back, dashing away.

 

“What the hell was that?” Lana asked.

 

“That’s actually fairly normal around here,” Jess said, hurrying along behind them.

 

……

 

Just when the weirdness was starting to feel normal, life is like, “Just kidding, there’s even weirder stuff!”

 

Magic.

 

Or…well, universe energies, if Stephen Strange is to be believed. There are apparently other realms where the very air is thick with energy or something, and he can channel the energy, which has considerably profound effects here on Earth.

 

Or something. I’m a scientist, this magic stuff is a little too much for me to cope with right now.

 

There is, however, a lost girl that just wants to get home to her brother, and I’m good at that.

 

It was easy enough to borrow a chopper from Tony, who is in a _really_ good mood lately, and fly the girl called Illyana Rasputin to Jersey.

 

Joke’s on you, Lana and Jubilee, I get to stop in anyway.

 

Stephen Strange tags along, currently raiding the mini bar, which is fully stocked because this is Tony Stark’s helicopter. Apparently, he can sense something in Illyana, that her time in this Limbo place has affected her on a fundamental level.  Not only does she have whatever mutant power she may have been born with, but she has an innate understand of the same powers he wields.

 

She really is Magik.

 

“ _So…your brother is Colossus_?” I ask her, and she looks over at me with a blink, nodding but not saying anything. “ _What’s he like_?”

 

“I…I do not know,” she says in the most adorable little Russian accent. “I have not seen him in…a very long time.”

 

She falls silent again, and I cast around for a topic. Kitty’s told me a little about Colossus. She actually once had a giant crush on him (“I just have a thing for guys named Peter, I guess!”), but he’s quite a bit older than her, so that didn’t last.

 

“ _Um…you know, my name is Peter, too_ ,” I tell her, and she glances up at me again.

 

“I…you are human?” she asks, and I just chuckle, nodding.

 

“ _Last I checked_ ,” I insist, and she giggles softly.

 

“Your voice sounds strange,” she tells me. “Like some of the demons I’ve met.”

 

I glance over to see Stephen sipping at some kind of amber liquid. He meets my eyes and snickers, pointedly turning around. Reaching up, I tug away my mask, and Illyana blinks, her face turning a bit pink.

 

“Oh,” she says dubiously. “You are much younger than I thought you would be.”

 

“That so?” I ask, shrugging. “Sorry to disappoint.”

 

“No, it’s…. I just haven’t spoken to a boy in quite a long time,” she says. “I was also…much younger when I left.”

 

“That’s gotta be insane,” I tell her, and she rolls her eyes.

 

“My entire life has just been one insane thing after the other for as long as I feel I can remember,” she says.

 

“I know a little how that feels,” I say. The helicopter lurches as we land, and before the rotors have even stopped, there’s a tapping on the door, which I hasten to open, pulling my mask back on. I’m met with the face of a man with dark brown hair that’s almost black. He’s huge, but the look on his face as his eyes move past me and land on Illyana is one of the most beatific happiness that I can’t help but smile a bit myself.

 

“My Snowflake,” he says, and Illyana gasps, rushing past me and leaping into his arms.

 

“Piotr!” she sings, squeezing the man tightly. Piotr staggers back only half a step, spinning her and holding her tightly. “I have missed you so much.”

 

“Illyana, every day that you were gone was torture to me,” Piotr says. “But what has happened to you? You are…much older.”

 

“And you look exactly the same,” Illyana says with a small cant of her head. “How long was I gone for?”

 

“Weeks,” Piotr says. “Not long enough for this to happen.”

 

“Pardon me,” Stephen says, stepping from the chopper as well. “My name is Stephen Strange. If you’d like, I think I can shed some more light on this whole situation. Do you have somewhere private we can speak?”

 

“Yes, we do,” Piotr says, gesturing toward the mansion. “Please, follow me.”

 

They stroll away, Illyana giving me one last little wave over her shoulder. I hop from the chopper myself, the door closing behind me. The pilot is just a Chameleon bot, so at least I’m not keeping anyone waiting if I go have a look around. A crowd has gathered, of course, but they’re already starting to disperse, a few of them looking at me with mild awe, gesturing at their friends.

 

“Spidey!” Kitty says, skipping over, and I see her with Jess, Lana, and Jubilee following behind. “Are you stalking me?”

 

“ _Alright, you got me_ ,” I say. “ _I’m actually really jealous, and I wanna join the X-Men, too_.”

 

“You joke, but that could be arranged,” Kitty says, taking my hands and pulling me into a hug. She’s hugged me before, and frankly, with our usual patrol piggyback rides, I should be used to her being so close to me, but something this hug feels different. It’s not a quick little hug, it’s a slow, sweet embrace, and she whispers softly in my ear, quietly enough that no one else could hear. “It would definitely be nice to spend some more time with my boyfriend.”

 

Damn it, Gwen, a little warning would have been nice!

 

She slips away, winking at me and skipping back over to the other girls. “X-Ladies, I think we should be good hostesses and treat Spider-Man to some lunch!” she says. “Are you hungry, Spidey?”

 

“ _I’m always hungry_ ,” I admit, following them.

 

……

 

“You’re not hungry, Mr. Fisk?”

 

“I’m afraid I’ve lost my appetite,” Wilson said, glaring at the ghost of his reflection in his window. On the other side, Manhattan glittered below him in the night, and out there, he knew that vigilante scum like Daredevil or the Punisher were taking to the streets, doing under cover of darkness what Spider-Man and his Neighborhood Watch had the gall do to in broad daylight.

 

Some small part of him admired the boy’s courage, though he also mocked Wilson by wearing a mask, hiding his identity as he paraded around in his pajamas and chipped away at his empire. Just today, his last-ditch attempt to simply assassinate the Spider had landed his most dangerous asset in jail. To his credit, Lester hadn’t ratted him out, but without Bullseye, he was minus a very valuable enforcer, one that would have been able to take out anyone else with ease. But Spider-Man and his friends were a formidable lot, and they had a knack for using the buddy system.

 

“Sir,” Wilson heard someone say from the doorway to his private dining area, and he looked up to see Frederick Foswell, his number two and man on the streets. He stepped in and shut the door behind him. Wilson looked over to his server, who nodded and quietly excused himself through a side door that led to the kitchens. The door shut with the soft click of a lock.

 

“What have you learned?” Wilson asked.

 

“Not much more than usual,” Foswell said. “We’ve tried tailing him, but he always finds our guys or gives them the slip. The same with his friends. We think we might have their supplier figured out, though. That’s the good news.”

 

“The bad news?” Wilson asked.

 

“It’s Oscorp,” Foswell said. “We could try to send a message, but they’re…big guns. Robots. Crazy suits of armor. They have Stark making them all kinds of toys. We’d have to hit them hard.”

 

Wilson sighed, staring out the window. This was going to expensive. “Call Phineas,” he said. “And Mr. Masters. I don’t care how many ‘toys’ Norman Osborn has, he also has a reputation to uphold. When our men go knocking at his door, I imagine his tune will change.”

 

“Gonna send a message?” Foswell asked, already getting his phone out.

 

“Send a message and gather information,” Wilson said. “They must have _something_ on this Spider-Man, and I will find it out.”

 

 


	12. Chapter 12

I’ve sometimes pondered what it would be like to have a little brother. Maybe if Mom and Dad made it long enough to give me one, or if Aunt May and Uncle Ben had had themselves a bundle of joy shortly after my arrival on their doorstep, I’d be dealing with the pressure of superhero life, normal life, and setting a good example for an impressionable little brat.

 

With the advent of Cindy Moon’s new spider-kids, though, my wonderings seem to have been brought to an end. Miles and Ganke, though not _too_ much younger than me, are still a little green in regards to the whole superhero shtick.

 

And damn, are they Spider-Man fans.

 

Julie was (and still is, though not as much) a fan of Black Widow, but it’s obvious that she’s now a Scarlet Spider follower. Even tonight, as we’ve decided to mix up our partnerships (Kitty is piggybacking on Gwen, which is the kind of fanservicey thought I do _not_ need distracting me tonight), Riley and Julie are still paired up.

 

And I get my two biggest fans.

 

It’s weird enough _having_ fans; spending any measure of time with them is just surreal.

 

“ _What’s the plan, Spidey_?” Ganke asks, bouncing excitedly in place. “ _Please tell me there’s a plan with like…stages and formations and stuff, right_?”

 

“ _Phage, chill_ ,” Miles says. Okay, he’s actually pretty alright. Miles and Ganke are polar opposites in just about every way. Where Miles is the cool, calm one, Ganke is just in this for the thrills.

 

They actually remind me a bit of myself and Harry.

 

“ _We usually don’t worry about formations and whatnot_ ,” I say. “ _Unless it’s like…the Hulk or something_.”

 

“ _Dude, I saw that on TV_!” Ganke said. “ _Did you actually become Thor_!?”

 

“ _For like five minutes_ ,” I say with a shake of my head. “ _The hammer was just settling for me. Agent Romanova showed up again at Oscorp just like…a week ago, and I asked her if I could hold the hammer again, and it plonked to the floor, so I guess I’m not worthy anymore. She says it was a heat-of-the-battle thing, that’s it. Now, can we stay on task_?”

 

“ _Right, task, right_ ,” Ganke says. I point down at the old office building. It’s currently owned by some random business with a buzzword name like Computech Industries or Global Confidential or something. The name doesn’t matter. The point is, the building is abandoned, but we have it on good authority that some of the basement levels are being used to arm common street thugs with guns of all shape and size in some sort of illegal arms ring.

 

“ _According to some reliable sources, there’s some kind of meeting between some bigwigs going on in this building tonight_ ,” I tell them. “ _If we can get them and hand them over to the police, we’ve crippled the arms suppliers for a_ lot _of bad guys_.”

 

“ _Do they have like warrants out on them or something_?” Miles asks, and I can’t help a small proud smile at that; he’s thinking ahead.

 

“ _You can expect most bigwigs to have a warrant_ ,” I say, “ _but at the very least the police are gonna wanna know why they were in a building full of guns in the first place. All we have to do is pin ‘em down and call in the tip. If nothing else, they’ll be tied up for a while, and that’s a disruption to the Maggia_.”

 

“ _That makes sense_ ,” Miles said. “ _Alright, so how we playing this? Sneaky or full-scale beat-em-up_?”

 

“ _Well, there’s not much reason to be sneaky_ ,” I say. “ _Let’s at least try to sneak up_ on _them, and once we have them all in our sights, we do the beat-em-up part_.”

 

“ _Can I just reiterate what an honor it is to work with you, Spider-Man_?” Ganke says, and I snort softly.

 

“ _For the twelfth time, duly noted_ ,” I tell him. “ _We ready to move out_?”

 

“ _Ready when you are, Spidey_ ,” Miles says.

 

“ _Spider-Bros, move out_ ,” I say, and we leap to swing in unison to the building.

 

“ _Dude_ ,” Ganke says as we swing. “ _Dude, he used it. He said ‘Spider-Bros’ when he mentioned us_.”

 

“ _Let’s just not make a big deal out of it, alright_?” Miles replies, and I just chuckle.

 

It really is just like having a couple of crazy little brothers.

 

I don’t mind it that much, I guess.

 

We swing down, climbing into two upper level windows and glancing around the abandoned offices, finding desks still stacked with files and plastic document trays loaded with papers and reports. Chairs, bulletin boards, even a few ancient computers; everything looks like the workers just went to lunch one day ten years ago and never came back. This place is an urban explorer’s dream.

 

“ _Anyone else getting a serious Fallout 4 vibe out of this place_?” Ganke asks, and Miles lets a breathy laugh into his mask.

 

“ _If we see any ghouls, I think we’ll be alright_ ,” he says.

 

“ _Yeah, we have maxed out stats and like every perk_ ,” I tell them, smirking.

 

“ _One of us_ ,” Ganke chants. “ _One of us_.”

 

I hold up a hand, and to their credit, they both fall silent almost immediately. I can hear voices on the bottom floor, what sounds like a heated argument.

 

“ _Athena, amplify and record_ ,” I say, and the voices are suddenly as loud as if the speakers were arranged around us.

 

“…move in on some of the places Spidey’s knocked out for him, we could really expand,” one of the voices says. “Split ‘em off, three ways. Everyone’s happy.”

 

“Except Spidey,” another voice says, this one gravely and raspy, like he’s spend his entire life with a cigar in his mouth. Indeed, before he speaks again, I can hear the soft puff as he takes a drag. “You still think he’s on some kinda agenda, and I’m tellin’ ya, he isn’t just focusing on the Kingpin. Kingpin’s just making the biggest fuss. We start making a fuss, we’re next. This little operation of yours is just asking to be shut down the hard way.”

 

“Look, I don’t care what kinda hunch you have, I _know_ Spidey’s got something out for Kingpin,” the first voice says, this one higher, younger, like he’s not much older than me. “He’s been out for the guy’s blood for weeks, going after his holdings and his operations and _only_ his.”

 

That’s not necessarily true. His have just been the most numerous.

 

“The only reason he’s doing that is because the Kingpin has shit going on everywhere,” Gravely-Voice says, voicing my point. Now that I’m listening to him, though, that voice sounds really familiar. “Sooner or later, he’s gonna run out of Kingpin’s places to pick on, and then he’ll come gunning for us. We don’t need to spend that time expanding when we could be building up our defenses and tightening up what we already have.”

 

“It pains to me agree with you, Joseph, but I do,” a third voice spoke up, this one sounding almost comically proper compared to the other two. I’d expect to hear a voice so well-articulated on Broadway, reciting Hamlet or something. “This Spider-Man is not pursuing some sort of agenda against Wilson Fisk. He is attempting to systematically eradicate all of us from this city.”

 

“See, Luke agrees with me,” Joseph says.

 

“Luchino,” Luke growled.

 

“Gesundheit,” Joseph replies, and I finally recognize his voice. Hammerhead Joey, with a skull rumored to be made from adamantium. Back when we were just the Spider-Trio, we tangled with him briefly. Apparently, he’s moved up in the world.

 

“Alright, so what’s the plan?” the younger, unidentified voice speaks up.

 

“ _The plan is we snag all three of these guys, right_?” Miles asks, and I nod.

 

“ _I think we’ve got all we need_ ,” I say. “ _I want the guy with the huge forehead. You guys get the other two_.”

 

“ _Dibs on Shakespeare_ ,” Miles said quickly.

 

“ _Aw, c’mon_ ,” Ganke protested.

 

“ _Nope, dibs are dibs_ ,” I say. “ _Three…two…one_!”

 

We burst into the room, and I’m rewarded with the sight of three mob leaders looking utterly shocked in our direction. Hammerhead Joey, the young fellow that’s probably the new head of the Silvermane family, and Luchino has to be the guy wearing the cape and fine suit with a lace cravat. Each of them is accompanied by two underlings, and I’m sure my girls (I hate using the phrase, but I have five girlfriends, sue me) would be glad to know that Hammerhead and Youngster Silvermane have elected to bring along a guy and a girl each. Only Luchino has kept things old-fashioned and brought two imposing male enforcers.

 

None of them really stand much of a chance against three plucky spider-powered teens, but Hammerhead’s, well…hammer head could actually cause us some problems, so I’ve volunteered to take him on.

 

“You again!” he yells, charging to his feet before the rest of them can even react to our presence. He may have a thick skull, but he’s quick on the uptake.

 

“ _Yeah, I just keep coming back_ ,” I say, crawling along the ceiling. “ _Like a bad rash but way better-looking_.”

 

“ _So much better-looking_ ,” Ganke says, and I hear Miles sigh.

 

“ _Don’t make it weird, man_ ,” he says.

 

“Shoot them!” Luchino shouts, and my spider-sense buzzes in my head before I leap forward, colliding with Hammerhead.

 

Ow.

 

“Yeah, I’ve had a few upgrades, kid,” Hammerhead says, grabbing me by the neck and squeezing, but I grab him and unload a shock into _his_ neck.

 

_Zzt-SHAF!_

 

“Ngah!” he yells out, tossing me away.

 

“ _Same_ ,” I say, holding my hands out.

 

_Twhip-thwip!_

 

His legs are webbed together as I feel another buzzing of my spider-sense, ducking under a quick lunge from Hammerhead’s female accomplice. She’s quick, obviously practiced in some kind of fighting style, but she’s simply no match for superhuman reflexes and borderline precognition. I dodge all of her hits with relative ease, at one point having to do sort of a pirouette to shape myself into a dodge away a hit of hers and what surely would have been a bone-breaking head-butt from Hammerhead.

 

“You are getting to a be a real pain in my neck, punk,” he says, and I leap away from a grab, casually webbing up his lady-friend.

 

“ _Are you sure it’s not the fact that you head-butt literally everything that bothers you_?” I ask, slipping away from him again and giving him a solid sock in the chest that I’m glad at least lifts him off his feet, staggering him back. “ _That can’t be good for your spine, you know. You probably have a couple vertebrae out of place or –_ “

 

“Will you shut the fuck up!?” he yells, lunging forward with his head, and I leap away again, webbing up his feet and watching him sprawl to the floor, taking a chunk out of the tile and exposing some cement underneath. I hop forward and grab his arms, pressing them together. He’s strong, but I’m stronger, and in short order, his arms are webbed together.

 

“ _Phage, can I get some natural webbing here_?” I call, and Ganke hops over, adding his stronger natural webs to my stuff, wrapping Hammerhead in a cocoon. I look around, and he’s already strung the rest of the thugs from the ceiling. Most of them are knocked out, a few struggling feebly against their binds. “ _Wow, nice work_.”

 

“ _So, what now_?” Miles asks, looking around the room, which seems to just be an old breakroom that’s been turned into a conference area. Other than a simple card table and a pool table nearby, there’s not much.

 

“ _Well, like Phage said, these guys probably have at least a couple warrants between them_ ,” I say. “ _We call in a tip, and the cops will get here, and…I mean, I’m not expert on probable cause or anything like that, but they’ll probably search the building and find a shit-ton of illegal guns_.”

 

“ _I told you shit-ton is still cool to say_ ,” Miles tells Ganke, who just lets a “psh” sound, holding his arms out in a shrug.

 

“ _Why do we gotta make a thing out of that_?” he asks. “ _I was ready to let it go_.”

 

“ _You never let_ anything _go_ ,” Miles says as we make our way toward the roof again. “ _You still keep bringing up that same argument about the Lord of the Rings movies_.”

 

“ _Why didn’t they just take the eagles from the start_?” Ganke asks, throwing his arms out.

 

“ _Because the journey was supposed to be a secret_ ,” I say as we swing away. “ _Eagles are too noticeable, and they would have had to land to get the Ring to the place where they had to drop it anyway. Safer to travel on foot_.”

 

The pair are silent for a long moment, and it’s only when we hear sirens blaring toward the old office building that Ganke speaks again.

 

“ _Will you adopt me_?”

 

……

 

“You’re adopted?” Flash asked, and Bobby shrugged.

 

“I think I might be,” he said. “I mean, my parents don’t have mutant powers.”

 

“Neither do mine,” Flash said, shrugging as well. “Hank says mutations are really complex. Just because you have one doesn’t mean your parents should, or even like your brother or sister.”

 

“Ugh, good,” Flash said. “I don’t know if I could handle a little sister with like…super speed or something.”

 

“Take it from a guy who’s been there,” Johnny said, sitting on Flash’s other side, “never team up with siblings. Sue and I drove each other nuts.”

 

“Oh yeah, Terrific Trio,” Bobby said. “You guys still do that, or…?”

 

“Nah, she and Ben are doing Avengers stuff now,” Johnny said. “And they don’t let under-eighteens on the Avengers.”  


“Dude, I bet in three or four years, we all just take over the Avengers,” Flash said. “That would be so sick.”

 

“A global Neighborhood Watch,” Johnny said with a grin. “I’d love to see that. I mean, people love us. I think I’m more popular as Dusk than I ever was as Johnny Storm.”

 

“We were featured on Good Morning America this morning, did you see?” Bobby, giving a small chuckle. “I think they think we’re college kids or something, since we got really active when summer hit.”

 

“Like…surprise, we’re actually just a bunch of high-schoolers,” Flash smirked. “It’s wild, though. I’m about to be a sophomore, and I’m already famous, saving the city, one crime at a time.”

 

“And we’re…like strategizing,” Johnny said with a glance over at them. “That’s the best part for me is that we’re not just running around beating up anyone we see doing a crime. We’re investigating and tracking down these guys, finding their bases and cleaning them out.”

 

“It definitely feels like a full-scale war on crime,” Flash agreed. “Mom always says I need a constructive hobby.”

 

“Does she know about your Neighborhood Watch stuff?” Johnny asked.

 

“Probably,” Flash admitted.

 

“The thing about being an X-Man is the family usually finds out right when you get your power,” Bobby said. “So, they know I can do ice things and Flash can shoot electricity out his butt – “

 

“Fuck you, too, Bobby.”

 

“ – and then they see Masked Ice Guy running around with Sparky McButtcheeks – “

 

“Seriously, wishing for a hot, dry summer.”

 

“ – most parents can put two and two together.”

 

“They aren’t worried?” Johnny asked. His own parents were terrified that he would get back into the world-saving thing with Sue and Ben, which only made his Dusk persona that much handier in hiding the fact that while he wasn’t saving the _world_ , he was helping keep New York safe with his best friend.

 

His best friend. Peter Parker, a.k.a. Spider-Man. He knew Pete and Harry were the kind of lifelong friends that most people only had one or two of, but whenever he was around the group, he never felt like the outsider. Pete had this way of making someone feel at complete ease around him, and around him, Johnny could just be himself. He was a normal kid who just kind of happened upon some really amazing powers, and while mutants could sympathize, some of them acted a little too entitled about their abilities, even going so far as to ostracize for “stealing their thunder” or something.

 

Pete, though, had acquired his powers under similarly odd circumstances, and more than anyone else, he and Gwen and Harry had been able to really understand what Johnny had been going through. And through them, Johnny had made some really good friends, like Bobby and Flash, who were mutants but totally blasé about it, treating Johnny like any other pal they hung out with.

 

“Oh, they’re probably completely out of their heads worrying,” Bobby said blithely. “But I’m sure they’d rather find out I’m running around New York and stopping crime than running off to fight like…Magneto or the Brotherhood or Hydra or something.”  


“Isn’t Magneto dead?” Johnny asked, and Flash nodded, his mouth full of falafel.

 

“Yep,” he said. “Xavier actually had a little assembly about it. Said that while Magneto was a bit misguided, all he ever wanted was a good life for mutants, and we should respect that.”

 

“This is the same Magneto that tried to like flood the world by reversing the magnetic poles, right?” Johnny asked, and Flash shrugged while Bobby spoke.

 

“They were good friends way back in the day, I guess,” he said. “Anyway, I guess his kids are running the Brotherhood now, but they’re like…our age or something, so they have no fucking clue what they’re doing.”

 

“Terrorists led by high-schoolers,” Johnny said. “Reassuring.”

 

“I know, right?” Bobby asked, glancing up sharply as a sound met their ears. Gunshots. They _were_ rather close to Hell’s Kitchen, and it was getting late in the evening, about the right time for the real criminal scum to take to the streets.

 

“Mask?” Bobby asks, changing to his ice form while an iridescent blue glow grew nearby as Flash shifted to full Electro form and lifted from the side of the building they were perched on to float in the air with a soft humming sound. Johnny had no such disguise unless he wanted to remain invisible throughout the fights they got in, and that came with a whole host of complications, so while his two companions got their mutant-power-based disguises, he had a mask with what was admittedly an awesome voice modulator, courtesy of Pete.

 

“ _Let’s hit it_ ,” Johnny said, and they took off, Flash zipping through the air like a lightning bolt while Johnny flapped alongside Bobby as he slid down on his ice trails. The trio zipped down to the street outside of what looked like a laundromat, landing in time to see three men and a woman tearing out of the front, shouting at each other in a language Johnny didn’t recognize. Behind them, a man strode purposefully toward the door, toting a gun.

 

“ _Iceman, door_!” Johnny said, and Bobby reacted instantly, coating the door in ice and freezing it shut. The man pursuing the fleeing workers (Johnny guessed) snarled at them, slamming his fists against the door. At a glance, he seemed to be like any other thirty-something criminal, albeit with a close-cropped “jarhead” haircut and what looked like standard-issue tactical camo military BDUs, down to the boots tied up over the cuffs of his pants. Instead of the normal shirt, though, he wore a black undershirt with a stylized white skull on it.

 

“Dude…” Flash said in awe. “Dude, that’s the Punisher.”

 

“ _Right, but a good guy shouldn’t really have people_ running in fear _of him, right_?” Johnny asked, and Flash snorted through his nose.

 

“Yeah, fair enough,” he said as the Punisher finally shot a few rounds at the door, shattering the glass and ambling through. “Alright, stop there!”

 

The Punisher just leveled a gun at them, and Johnny kicked up a barrier around the trio.

 

“This ain’t your beat, kiddos,” the Punisher said. “Get outta here before you get yourselves hurt.”

 

“Um…I’m sorry, but are _you_ the one that’s gonna be doing the hurting?” Bobby asked with a snicker. “Because you’re a guy with some guns, and we’re like…three superheroes, so…okay, try to hurt us _at all_.”

 

“ _Iceman, let’s try not to antagonize him_ ,” Johnny said, though he could see his friend’s point. The Punisher was definitely powerful. For a normal human being. “ _Why are you chasing those people with a gun_?”

 

“Money-laundering,” the Punisher said. “Drug trafficking, aiding and abetting known members of the Silvermane family, _and_ prostitution. You wanna let those kinds of people run free?”

 

“No, but they sure don’t deserve to be violently killed by a gun-toting guy with a fucking skull on his chest,” Flash said. “What are you gonna do, just shoot everyone that breaks the law until they’re too afraid to break it?”

 

“If that’s what it takes,” the Punisher shrugged.

 

“ _That sounds like a one-way ticket to becoming a villain, friend_ ,” Johnny said. “ _No criminal deserves to die if there’s a chance they can reform, and how will we know they can reform if you just kill all of them_?”

 

“That’s fine and dandy until everyone uses their second chance to kill twenty more people,” the Punisher growls.

 

“Right, but it’s okay for you to run around and be a mass-murderer if you think you’re right,” Bobby said. “That’s just Supervillain Origin Story 101 stuff right there.”

 

“ _Didn’t you escape from prison like a few weeks ago_?” Johnny asked as Bobby iced the man’s feet to the ground and Flash held out a hand, causing his gun to zip away with his electromagnetic powers. “ _Maybe you should use this round in prison to actually contemplate that you might have the wrong idea on crime-fighting instead of just killing people and shoving others out of the way of your genocidal rage_.”

 

“I’m trying to save this city,” the Punisher snarled at them, tugging fruitlessly at the ice around his feet.

 

“ _You are murdering people_ ,” Johnny said. “ _You are a murderer. Stop for a moment and try to think of anyone who would be proud of what you’re doing. Can you_?”

 

The Punisher just glared at them, and Johnny rolled his eyes.

 

“I don’t think we’re gonna pep-talk him out of his murderous ways,” Bobby said. “Prison?”

 

“ _Prison, it is_ ,” Johnny said, shrugging. “ _Maybe he’ll finally have an epiphany of some sort_.”

 

……

 

Julie liked to hope that someday, she would say or do something that would just snap Riley out of whatever funk she’d been in since the moment the two had met, to galvanize the girl she was increasingly inclined to believe she was in love with into an epiphany of sorts.

 

Of course, Riley was…complicated, in what seemed to be every sense of the word. The more Julie managed to find out about this girl, though, the more she felt herself compelled to unravel more, to peel away layers and layers of tangled, knotted strings and find out what was at the core of this beautiful mess of a human being. It was like a puzzle she’d never meant to pick up but couldn’t put down now that she’d found out it existed.

 

It was probably wholly unhealthy to be this fixated on another human being, but Julie couldn’t help herself. Riley Benson was just so…fascinating. That was how she felt, and she was sure others knew it was how she felt, but it was a mark of how truly screwed-up Riley Benson’s life was that they simply allowed it to continue.

 

What did it say about the situation that this strange thing Riley and Julie had going was better than whatever Riley had been confronting on her own? Julie hated to overestimate her impact on the world in any capacity, but Riley almost seemed to…to _need_ her. The few times she’d actually gotten up the courage to ask Riley about the rather intense bond they seemed to share, Riley had just kind of shrugged it off, smiling warmly at Julie and speaking the words that sent her all aflutter with stereotypical schoolgirl crush-thoughts.

 

“Maybe the Scarlet Spider really does need her Spider-Girl.”

 

Everything about that statement had tickled all of the best places in Julie’s mind to keep her from asking too much more.

 

At least, until tonight.

 

Things started off normally enough, with Julie and Riley swinging through the streets, simply on patrol. She liked to think it was a mark of the impact they were having on New York that lately, there just weren’t enough missions to go around, leaving a few groups picking out an area to clean up from petty crimes.

 

“ _Woah_ ,” Julie said, feeling a blazing tingle in her skull and landing on a wall to collect herself. Riley landed next to her, peering closely at her from behind her masks’ glowing pink eyes.

 

“ _You alright_?” she asked, and Julie nodded.

 

“ _Spider-sense is wigging out_ ,” she said, feeling Riley looking around next to her before she shook herself back to the present and did the same. The street around them was actually fairly quiet, a few passing citizens spotting them and waving, cell-phone flashes going off as they took pictures of the pair.

 

Quite suddenly, the citizens below scattered as a thunderous boom came from above them, rattling windows around them and cracking a few. Riley and Julie quickly snapped their gazes upward to see a man with metal wings and cybernetic bird legs fighting someone in a red and blue costume that looked somewhat like the ones the spider members of the Watch wore.

 

“ _Who the hell…_ ” Julie’s question trailed off as the pair careened over the street and landed roughly on a rooftop. “ _Let’s go_.”

 

They webbed up onto the rooftop to see a man hunched forward on inverted cybernetic legs, brandishing metal wings at the costumed man across the rooftop. The winged one’s face was obscured by a mask stylized into a grinning bird face with two glowing green eyes.

 

“ _The Vulture…_ ” Riley muttered.

 

“Right in one, sister!” the other one yelled, holding out his arms triumphantly. “We meet once more!”

 

“ _Oh, no fucking way_ ,” Riley grumbled. “ _You!?_ ”

 

“ _This is getting out of hand_ ,” the Vulture said, glancing between the trio before spreading his wings. “ _I warned Otto what would happen if he let you freaks run amok_.”

 

“Oh, do you hear that?” the other one said. “That, friends, is the sound of the pot calling the kettle black! Hypocrisy at its very finest!”

 

“ _Stay behind me_ ,” Riley said in a quiet voice, and though Julie wasn’t one to play the damsel in distress, something in Riley’s modulated tone told her to do what her partner said. Peeking out from behind Riley, Julie watched as the Vulture started to take off, but the other guy was ready, getting a running start and leaping at him, grabbing onto his legs.

 

“Help me, Sister!” he yelled. “Use your webbing!”

 

“ _He needs to not call me that_ ,” Riley said, though she grudgingly held out her hands.

 

_Thwip-thwip!_

 

“ _Agh_!” the Vulture shouted, his wings whining with a loud rushing sound as they strained against the strength of Riley’s webs, but Riley gripped tightly onto a metal pipe sticking out of the roof, Julie adding what she could by wrapping her arms around Riley and gripping the pipe as well. The strange man crawled along the Vulture, gripping his wings at the bases and yanking them free with twin _pop_ sounds, leaving the flying man to plummet to the rooftop with the other pinning him to the ground.

 

“Now, Icarus you shall know what happens to those who fly too close to the sun!” Riley’s self-proclaimed brother said, gripping the Vulture’s head. “You have crashed, and now shall you burn! Enjoy these moments, as they shall be your last!”

 

“ _Stop!_ ” Riley said, charging forward. “ _We don’t kill! We never kill! If you’re…. If I’m your sister like you say I am, you know this_!”

 

Riley’s…brother? Riley’s brother snarled but paused, staring up at her from behind his mask.

 

“Peter Parker doesn’t kill,” he said. “Peter Parker is good, the saint, the paladin upholding his virtue…. But is it because he’s faced the darkness and emerged in the light, or has he seen only the shadows? Perhaps he, perhaps you do not know of the Dark. The encompassing blackness that exposes the shadows for what they truly are, a pale, glowing echo of despair. You were born with a life already lived, but do you know what it is to have no life? To claw at the edges of madness and have no lifeline, nothing to pull you back to the light?”

 

“ _What pulled_ you _back_?” Riley asks. “ _You’re much less…insane than you were before_.”  


“The Witches Three,” the other said with a chuckle that had a hysterical edge to it. It was a wholly disconcerting sound. “They dug and rooted around in my skull, finding the fragments, the gems, dusting away the sand and grime that built up in the gaps. They filled me with purpose, with life, with… _being_. I was a mindless chattering beast before, but now…now, I have purpose.”

 

“ _And what is that purpose_?” Riley asked, and her…brother of sorts chuckled, yanking away his mask to reveal…Peter? He looked _exactly_ like Peter Parker, though with noticeably longer hair and a wild look in his eyes.

 

“My purpose is my name,” he said with a manic grin. “I am the Guardian no longer. Now, I am…Spidercide. There is a pretender among our ranks, one who calls himself Spider but has been taken, manipulated into that which he isn’t. It is my goal, my given purpose, to find him and end him. We wish you and our Brother no harm, nor any of his ilk.” He glanced Julie. “Live the life you have been given, and count yourself blessed.”

 

“ _Wait, hold on_ ,” Riley said. “ _Who’s this ‘pretender’? Who’s ‘we’_?”

 

Spidercide just chuckled. “Dear sister, did you never think about us?” he asked. “Seven tanks. Seven clones. Did it never occur to you to ponder what the rest were up to? What our hated Father meant for us?”

 

“ _Octavius_ ,” Riley said. “ _What did he_ – “

 

“He’s been oddly…absent, has he not?” Spidercide asked, pacing slowly in front of them, gesturing at the Vulture’s prone form. “His minions continue to parade around, but where has he been? You are we, and we are you, and we know that out of sight would be wonderful if it meant out of mind. It’s often temping to fool ourselves into thinking it. But you know better.”

 

“ _What did he do with…with Peter’s blood_?” Riley asked.

 

“He created us,” Spidercide said. “Seven clones to serve his purposes. One dead before he could live, one creating a life of her own, different even from the rest. One given new life, a new mind.” He poked at his own skull. “And one leading a resistance, an effort to silence the usurper. But one…one is doing the usurping.”

 

“ _Stop talking in fucking riddles_!” Riley said. “ _I get that that’s a thing you do, but a straight answer would be nice_!”

 

Spicercide just laughed, a mad, cackling noise that echoed into the sky. “The Parker temper!” he shouts jubilantly. “Dearest sister, I speak in riddles because this is a problem that our eldest brother knows about and wishes to tackle himself. He has forbidden me from speaking of it to you, in every way he can. But you can help. You must help. Only one of our batch has perished, and the rest are at large. One…one is astray, a puppet, made to believe he is that which he isn’t. You must help him. We must help him.”

 

“ _How_?” Riley asked. “ _I want to help, but I need to know how_.”

 

Spidercide seemed to be struggling for words. “I will be punished,” he said. “But you must help. The walking stick. The Rosebud. Abel’s treacherous brother. Ngah!”

 

He staggered to the edge of the building, and Riley made to follow, but he waved her off.

 

“You mustn’t!” he said. “I’ll find you, you won’t find me, branches springing out the tree, leaves that grow, sprouting tall, one has risen that must fall!”

 

He leapt from the building, crawling down the side and leaping along the streets. Riley stood and watched, standing stock-still. Julie made her way over and placed a hand on her elbow, jumping when Riley jerked and glanced back at her. Julie tugged her mask away, staring up at her best friend.

 

“What…the hell was that?” she asked, watching as Riley pulled her own mask away, though from her expression, she was lost in thought, a distant look in her bright blue eyes.

 

“Kaine,” she said. “Walking stick, Rosebud, Abel’s brother. Kaine. We need to find Kaine.”

 

“Riley, please,” Julie said, gripping Riley’s arms. “I…I’m kinda lost here, and I wanna help you, but….”

 

“Julie, I…” Riley trailed off, sighing and rubbing at her temples. “I…. There’s some stuff going on that…that might really affect how you…you know, feel about me. And I…damn it, I was gonna tell you this, but not for a while.”

 

“Riley,” Julie said, staring up at her. “Nothing, and…I mean _nothing_ could ever make me…love you any less than I do. Okay?”

 

“You….”

 

“No, listen to _me_ for two seconds, okay?” Julie asked, and Riley nodded. “I have never been more…attached to any single person in my life. You are the only thing that matters to me. So you can tell me anything about yourself, and short of find out you’re like a genocidal alien bent on wiping out mankind, I’ll probably just shrug. Even if you _are_ a genocidal alien thing, I might be okay with that.”

 

Riley just giggled, and Julie smiled up at her.

 

“It’s…still a bit weird, but, okay,” Riley said. “Um…so, a while back, I…Peter…was…kidnapped by Dr. Octopus….”

 

……

 

“So…he’s a doctor?” Cindy asked, and Mary Jane nodded.

 

“His name is Curt Connors, and he’s like…this completely brilliant geneticist or something,” she said, smiling fondly. “God, Pete loves his work. I remember in like seventh grade, he did this really amazing report on Connors, and Carl King would keep asking him when they were gonna get married.”

 

“Carl King is a total asshole,” Cindy said. “I’m glad he never came back to school, really.”

 

“He was a total dick to Peter,” Mary Jane said, prompting a little smile from Cindy.

 

“You _really_ seem to like Pete,” she said, and Mary Jane felt her face heat up. Okay, maybe she’d been getting a little too enthusiastic about relating everything back to her boyfriend, but she was a high-school girl in love. She couldn’t really be blamed for a bit of a mild obsession, right?  


“I just…he’s my best friend, is all,” she said. “He’s a sweet boy. He doesn’t deserve to be bullied like that.”

 

“Oh, I agree, totally,” Cindy said with a grin. “I actually…. I mean, okay, maybe I still do, but back in the day, I had the hugest crush on Pete.”

 

“No way,” Mary Jane said disbelievingly. “For real?”

 

“Completely,” Cindy said, brushing a lock of her long black hair behind her ear, smiling at Mary Jane brightly enough that her already narrow eyes squinted a bit. “I dunno, he always struck me as this quiet artsy nerd type, you know? Like…the quiet type that once you talked to him, he would just be the stereotypical wise nerd, I guess. Like in the movies. He was the Edward Cullen to my Bella Swan.”

 

“Ew, you know he hates Twilight,” Mary Jane said, and Cindy just cackled a bit.

 

“Yeah, but still,” she said with a shrug. “Um…I mean, I even sent him like this mushy secret admirer note on Valentine’s Day.”

 

“That was you!” Mary Jane said with a smirk. “I thought…you know, with the moon you drew, that….”

 

“Yeah, okay, not my subtlest moment,” Cindy admitted with a snort. “I dunno, I think I was maybe hoping he’d figured it out and…hell, I dunno what I was hoping for. I’m kinda getting over him a little, though. I mean, I barely knew the guy, and I haven’t really had much of a chance to chat with him with this whole Neighborhood Watch thing going on.”  


“Hm,” Mary Jane mused, smirking over at her. “What if the two of you wound up patrolling together, all by yourselves?”

 

“Oh, no way,” Cindy said, giggling. “No, what would be so awkward. I mean…he’s with Gwen, right?”  


“Yeah, that’s true,” Mary Jane said, nodding. “Still, don’t you at least wanna be friends with him? I bet you two would get along so well together.”  


Cindy nodded, smiling sweetly. “I guess…that would be pretty cool,” she said. “Maybe I can’t be his one and only, but I’d love to get to know him better. I mean…he started this whole thing, this…saving the city thing. He’s…the kind of genuinely good guy you don’t meet that often.”

 

“That’s very true,” Mary Jane said. “Well, I could use my connections, pull a few strings, and maybe I could get you two teamed up on the next patrol, maybe. I mean…I’m pretty tight with the boss, you know.”

 

“Gosh, you would use your status to help poor ol’ me snag a patrol with Spider-Man himself?” Cindy asked with a little smirk. “It’s nice to have friends in high places.”  


“Cin, look around,” Mary Jane said, gesturing out at the city sprawled below them. “We’re all in high places.”

 

……

 

“Um…Tadashi?” Jean asked. “Can we maybe move Fred somewhere else? I’m getting a contact high just from having his brain around.”

 

Tadashi chuckled at her, mirth in his warm brown eyes, and Jean couldn’t help but smile at the amused tenor to his thoughts. This boy was bad for her heart, damn it.

 

“Fred,” he said, looking over at his friend, who was either asleep or very close to it, lounging across one of the couches with an empty plate on his stomach that had once held some of his “special brownies”. “Taco Bell run?”

 

“Oh…” Fred said, his eyes cracking open. “Bro, you know, I am seriously _feeling_ some Taco Bell right now. Right in my soul, right?”

 

“I understand,” Tadashi said. “Jean and are actually getting the craving, too. Think you can help us?”

 

“Dude, I will be your hero,” Fred said, clambering to his feet, his thoughts condensing with purpose. “You two don’t need to worry about a thing. Fredzilla to the rescue, right now. I’m gonna get us all some Taco Bell and make the world right again.”

 

“I knew I could count on you,” Tadashi said as Fred meandered toward the elevator, a smile on his face as he plodded in. He gave them a little salute as the doors shut, disappearing from view. His fuzzy thoughts drifted away until Jean could barely even register them among the din of distant brains.

 

“He’s actually really sweet,” Jean said, and Tadashi chuckled.

 

“He’s a good guy,” he said. “And like I said, I owe him for getting me through college. His stoner buddies would crash at our place, and I would wake up at the crack of dawn to get to class, and let me tell you, there isn’t much more inspiring than twelve our thirteen people coming down from various trips telling you to do your best and knock ‘em dead out there. Most of that stuff is empty platitudes, but these guys _meant_ it.”

 

“That’s amazing,” Jean said with a giggle. “I hope my college experience includes a bunch of stoner encouragements before every lesson.”

 

“How old even _are_ you?” Tadashi asked. “I never really bothered asking, I guess.”

 

“Seventeen,” Jean said. “I go into my twelfth-grade classes next year.”

 

“Such a young pup,” Tadashi chuckled, and Jean rolled her eyes.

 

“Right, because twenty-two is _so old_ ,” she said, earning a smirk from Tadashi.

 

“It is, compared to seventeen,” he said. Jean just fixed him with a withering stare.

 

“If I was twenty and you were twenty-five, no one would say a thing,” she said defensively, and Tadashi just smiled at her in a way that made Jean’s face redden.

 

“I’m gonna pretend not to understand what you mean by that,” he said.

 

Jean just huffed softly, going back to the console. He seemed rather determined not to acknowledge the real chemistry they had, and the few times that Jean had given into temptation and peeked into his head to find out why, she saw that it was simply because she wasn’t even out of high-school, yet. It was something Logan once crudely referred to as the “jailbait wait”. It was sweet, in a way, but downright frustrating at times. Putting those thoughts out of her head, she plucked at a few keys, bringing up the latest breakthrough in their project.

 

“Okay, so…you wanna actually _make_ a brain?” Jean asked, and Tadashi glanced at her with a rueful smile.

 

“I don’t believe I actually told you about that,” he said with a playfully accusatory tone, and Jean just snorted.

 

“You were barely saying anything during lunch, so I wanted to see what you were spinning around in your head,” she said. “I was planning just a peek, but…it was kinda fascinating, so I stuck around.”

 

Tadashi just reached out and tousled her hair, eliciting a small squeak of alarm as she combed her fingers through it to fix it. “I was thinking about this synthesizer Tony made. He used it a while back to try to replicate some kind of unbreakable spider-web or…something. I’m fuzzy on the details. In any case, I think that if we can add the right combination of elements, plug in the measurements, then boom, brain matter.”

 

“That sounds like it has the potential to be insanely complicated,” Jean said, and Tadashi laughed.

 

“Yeah, science is kinda like that sometimes,” he said. “But not to worry, I we have a chemistry expert right here at Oscorp.”

 

“It’s Fred, isn’t it?” Jean asked in a knowing voice. Tadashi rolled his eyes.

 

“However did you see through his clever ruse?” he asked dryly, and Jean smirked impishly up at him. “Actually, Aiko is something of a whiz in the field. She once came up with an aerosol spray that was capable of breaking down any metal into dust on contact.”

 

“That’s incredibly dangerous,” Jean said matter-of-factly.

 

“Yeah, that one got shelved in a hurry after the head of the lab’s wedding ring got hit with a blast of it,” Tadashi said, chuckling at the memory. “He thought it was amazing. His wife was…understandably upset.”

 

“How many of these little anecdotes do you have?” Jean asked, and Tadashi shrugged.

 

“Hey, we’re three whacky scientists and their rich stoner friend,” he said. “We could be a TV series.”

 

Jean shook her head ruefully. “I’d watch it,” she said. “So, where is Aiko?”  


“She’s working on a super-secret project for a…special client of ours.”

 

“Is this client a mild-mannered teenage boy with spider powers and a lot of weird friends of his own?” Jean asked, and Tadashi smirked at her.

 

“Reading my mind again?” he asked wryly, and she shook her head.

 

“No, that’s one secret I’ve mostly pieced together on my own,” she said. “Sort of. From snippets from other minds.”

 

“Jean Grey, you are the worst kind of eavesdropper,” Tadashi said with another tousle of her hair.

 

“I’m getting better!” she protested in a whine. “Some people just think stuff _really loud_ , though!”

 

……

 

“Peter, there you are!” Aiko shouts as I step out of the elevator to the R&D floor, met with the sight of the tall blonde smiling widely at me. “COME LOOK WHAT I MADE YOU!”

 

In response, I just point to my ears, and she gets the message, reaching up and pulling her earbuds out.

 

“Sorry,” she says in a more normal tone, taking my hand in both of hers and pulling me down another side hallway comprised of more cubicles. She stops outside of one and hurries inside, rummaging around. “So, anyway, when we found out you were Spider-Man – “

 

“Which is one of those huge life-altering secrets that I’m still wholly uncomfortable with you knowing – “

 

“But I do, so there it is,” Aiko says, still rifling through a cabinet. “So, I was like…’I wanna help’, you know? And I noticed that your web-shooters are artificial.”

 

“Yeah, some of us get natural webbing, but the rest have to compensate,” I tell her, and she nods eagerly, her long blonde hair flying around her as she stands and rushes back to me.

 

“I made you these!” she says, thrusting a pair of fingerless gloves into my hands. The wrists are mounted with what look at first glance like the bulkiest watches I’ve ever seen. “I tried to keep it as close to your original design, because I know muscle-memory can be a bitch to work around, and your shooters were actually pretty ingenious, but I refined the web formula so it’s stronger and doesn’t dissolve after so long. I also gave you stun goo!”

 

“Stun goo?”

 

“Stun goo!”

 

“And it…does what, exactly?”

 

“Okay,” she says, “so I actually kind of got the idea from certain spiders that cause paralysis when they bite you, which is actually sort of horrific, but also can be handy if you don’t go for the full respiratory-failure type of paralysis and just go for the slight muscle numbness type that goes away after about a minute or so.”

 

“So, how do I do that?” I ask, and she curls her fingers into a sort of claw, fingers pressed tightly against her palms.

 

“Just do this, hold the hand out, and _sploot_!”

 

“ _Sploot_.”

 

“ _Sploot_!”

 

So, now I have stunning _sploot_ gel. Maybe letting Tadashi and Co. find out about my spider-related proclivities wasn’t such a bad thing.

 

“Well…thanks, Aiko,” I say, and she smiles, spotting something over my shoulder. I turn and look, snorting out a laugh at what I see.

 

“Bro, this is the best thing ever!” Harry says, zooming by on what looks like a bright black and yellow hoverboard. “Reiko totally hooked me up with like…Hoverboard 2.0 with reticulating action!”

 

“Do you even know what reticulating means?” I ask.

 

“Nope!” he says happily, spinning on the spot. “Dude, this thing rides like a dream. Like…Pete, yours was great, but this chick went to _college_ for this kind of stuff.”

 

Reiko strolls over, a huge pink bubble blooming in front of her before it pops, pulled back in for more chewing. “’Sup, Spider-Man?” she asks. “Hope you don’t mind, I saw your pal zooming around on that hoverboard you made. Pretty good for a first try, but I couldn’t help myself.”

 

“No, no, not at all,” I say, shaking my head. This new hoverboard is obviously way more sophisticated. Where mine looked more like a simple, featureless flying snowboard, this one has two obvious hover units that seem to be connected with a flexible platform that bends and twists slightly with Harry’s movements. “It’s…way more than I could ever hope to build.”

 

“Yet,” Reiko says, trotting over and reaching up to tap me on the head with some kind of socket wrench. “Fine line between humility and just plain ragging on yourself, Bug Boy. Tread lightly. Now, this thing collapses, too. He’s got a control unit on his wrist.”

 

“Yellow button?” Harry asks, and Reiko nods. Harry gives it a tap, and the board folds out from under him, shrinking into a disk that fits perfectly onto his back.

 

“If you’re hard up for a weapon, you can mount it on your wrist and smack people with it,” Reiko says. “But it’s not like adamantium or vibranium. It’ll dent. If you break it, I’m charging you for the next one.”

 

“Pete, these guys are fully upgrading us,” Harry says with a grin.

 

“Well, you’re our boss’s son,” Reiko says with a shrug, smirking. “I could use some brownie points.”

 

“I am so not mad at all about being exploited for brownie points,” Harry says, tapping at his wrist. The disk on his back floats down and unfolds back into his hoverboard, and he buzzes away, pulling his mask on. “Juju _be, let’s shred up New York_!”

 

“For real, though,” I say turning back to Reiko and Aiko. “Thanks. I mean…I could never have come up with this stuff while being Spider-Man _and_ Peter Parker.”

 

“Just consider it our part in helping clean up the city,” Aiko says with a bright smile. “We all like what you’re doing. I mean…the whole reason any of us became scientists is to better the world. If our inventions are used by you to wipe out crime, that’s a win for us, too.”

 

“What school did you guys go to?” I ask.

 

“MIT,” Aiko says. “Reiko did a few courses at Empire State University, too, right?”

 

“They have an awesome engineering program,” Reiko says with a grin. “Bunch of misogynist dick-bags that needed a woman to come in and show them that you don’t need a Y-chromosome to revolutionize hover technology. I think I got about four marriage proposals in the first month.”

 

“Girl power,” I say flatly, raising a fist, and she smirks, reaching out to bump it.

 

“ _Yoooooo, Pete_ ,” Harry says, floating back around us with Jubilee perched on the board in her new outfit (designed, surprisingly, by Flash Thompson, who’s retained a lot of the sewing knowhow he picked up in Life Skills), which is a mostly black affair with bright pink and yellow accents and a golden starburst logo on the chest. Apparently, she’s chosen the name Dazzler, which is appropriate, all things considered. “ _We’re gonna go test out this new board, but party at your place later_?”

 

“Wait, what?” I ask. “No, there was no party discussed. When were we talking about a party?”

 

“ _C’mon, we don’t patrol on Sundays anyway, and we need a genuine high-school house party in an actual house_ ,” Harry insists. “ _Not a penthouse_.”

 

“But why _my_ house?” I ask.

 

“ _Because you’re the leader of the Neighborhood Watch_!” he says. “ _We need to mingle in your house, get to really know each other, bond, and fuck around with all of your old inventions you have scattered around your room_.”

 

“I’m beginning to think you actually believe we live in some kind of whacky kids TV show or something,” I tell him, and he chuckles through his modulator.

 

“ _Yo, I’d believe that_ ,” he says. “ _So, tonight at like…seven? Eight? Aunt May’s got a company thing anyway_.”

 

“Aunt May has no such company thing,” I tell him.

 

……

 

“Oh, Peter, I forgot to tell you,” Aunt May says as I stroll into the house, trailed by Gwen and Mary Jane, who seem to just sort of be my entourage lately. “I have a company retreat tonight. I’m so sorry I forgot to let you know, but you’ve just been in and out of the house so often, I never really got a moment.”

 

“This is like one of those jump-cuts in a comedy movie or something,” I say, and Gwen snickers behind me, leading MJ toward my room. “Is this where you tell me it’s an overnight thing and you have a hotel room booked?”

 

“I always knew I raised a smart little man,” she says, smiling fondly at me as she sips at an afternoon cup of tea. I make my way over to her electric kettle and flip it back on, getting three teacups ready. “I’ll be back sometime tomorrow afternoon, but I think you can handle yourself until then, hm?”

 

“If not, Gwen and MJ usually manage to keep me out of too much trouble,” I tell her. She chuckles, sipping at her tea while the kettle starts to hum softly as it heats up.

 

“Those two are such sweet girls,” she says. “Mary Jane, though…I think she might have a little crush on you. I was a little worried that she and Gwen might not get along, but they’re just the best of friends.”

 

“Yeah, it’s weird,” I say shrugging. “All of the girls in my life seem to get along really well.”

 

“That’s good, though,” Aunt May says. “Too many people in this world get so jealous and resentful of each other. Why, where I work, sometimes I feel like I’m back in my days as a lunch lady, watching a bunch of children bicker and fight over petty little ‘drama’ moments. Grown men and women, mind you. And here you are, children with your whole lives ahead of you, and you have so much sorted out.”

 

“Well, I was raised by such wonderful parents, I guess that good upbringing sort of seeped into my friend group,” I say, and Aunt May gives me another smile, patting my head as I pour some tea into our teacups.

 

“I’m sure your Uncle would be proud of the man you’re becoming,” she says, and I nod.

 

“I sure hope so,” I tell her. “I’m…doing what I can to be the best person I can.”

 

“You’re doing much more than any boy could ever be expected to,” she says with a meaningful look at me over the rim of her teacup. For one small second, my heart lurches. Does she know? MJ mentioned the other day that she seemed to act really familiar with “Spider-Man”, but I just chalked that up to her being the sort of woman to mother anyone younger than her. “With your internship at Oscorp and all of the people you’re helping there.”

 

“Oh, yeah,” I say, exhaling a breath I didn’t know I was holding. “Yeah, I mean…I’m no Tony Stark, but I hope I can be someday.”

 

“You know, I’ve spoken to Tony Stark a few times at work,” she says. “He’s a good man. A bit of a rascal, but he’s good. I’m glad you’ve gotten this opportunity to study with him. Lord knows your Uncle Ben and I did our best, but you have so much of your parents in you. After a while, we just sat back and watched you become the genius you are today. You need a mentor in your life that can help you and nurture that big brain of yours.”  


“Aw, you guys did great, Aunt May,” I insist, and she smiles, standing and heading over to plant a kiss on my forehead.

 

“I’m going to go finish packing, but I expect a goodbye hug from all three of you before I leave,” she says with mock sternness, and I salute crisply.

 

“Yes, Ma’am, Aunty Ma’am,” I say, and she playfully smacks my chest.

 

“Alright, I think you’ve steeped that tea long enough,” she says. “I’m getting the caffeine jitters just smelling it.”

 

“Haaaa,” I say dryly as she strolls away, adding some milk and sugar before carting the tree teacups downstairs. Spider reflexes come in handy once more in weird everyday ways, as I used to have trouble managing one teacup to my room, but now I’m balancing three with little to no effort.

 

“Tea-ter Parker!” MJ exclaims as I make my way to the basement, and I snort.

 

“Alright, grade-A pun, there,” I say as she kisses me and takes her tea, passing the other cup to Gwen, who also plants a little kiss to my lips. “Did you guys come up with that one while I was upstairs?”

 

“I’m almost embarrassed to say that it took us a full five minutes and a _lot_ of just really bad puns,” Gwen says, and I snicker, kissing her before the two take a sip of their teacups, wincing at the taste.

 

“Jesus, Pete, tea is supposed to be a _delicate_ taste, not leaves trying to be coffee,” MJ says, and Gwen giggles a bit.

 

“I forgot that you like your tea as strong as Red Bull,” she says. I just huff and sip at my own tea, which seems the perfect blend of taste, sugar, and smooth milk.

 

“You two just don’t have the right pallet to appreciate my tea-brewing skills,” I say, and Gwen snags up a stuffed Pikachu that she won for me at a carnival years ago, tossing it me. I catch it effortlessly and cradle it to my chest.

 

“Hey, hey, Kip the Pikachu did nothing to deserve being used as a projectile,” I say, and Gwen pouts, holding her hands out. I pass the plush Pokémon to her, and she hugs it. “Apologize to him.”

 

“I’m sorry, Kip,” she says to the Pikachu. “You were just an unfortunate bystander in a battle over the merits of proper tea-brewing. Can you ever forgive me?” She holds the Pikachu to her ear, and Mary Jane and I laugh as she nods, “listening” to him. “He says he doesn’t want anyone to fight anymore. He just wants peace in our little basement paradise.”

 

“Then we should cease-fire right away,” Mary Jane says. “Kip just wants a peaceful future for all Pokémon.”

 

“A noble cause,” I insist with a grave nod. “Very well. Let it be said that today was the last one spent battling over the proper methods of brewing tea. Henceforth, each man and woman will brew their own tea, and no judgment shall be passed over personal preferences.”

 

“Agreed,” Gwen said.

 

“Also agreed,” Mary Jane said with a snicker.

 

We don’t even make it a second before the two girls burst into giggles, and I can’t help but chuckle out a laugh after that.

 

“That took a very weird turn,” Mary Jane says, and Gwen just nods.

 

“Poor Kip is probably just going ‘Put me down, I’ll have no part of your ridiculous games’,” she says.

 

“When the stuffed Pikachu is the voice of reason, we have a real problem,” I say, and the two girls just laugh harder, Mary Jane standing and trotting over to wrap her hands around one of my wrists, pulling me from my chair to the bed.

 

“Well, all things said, I think our first act of peace should be cuddles on the bed,” she says, toppling onto the bed with me, the two of us joined quickly be Gwen, who clambers onto us and sort of flumps over both of us.

 

“I like this idea,” she says. “This is a good idea.”

 

……

 

“I think it might have been a bad idea to tell you about the clone thing,” Riley said, and Julie stared up at her in shock.

 

“How could you even _say_ that?” she asked, latching onto Riley and sliding her hand down to the older girl’s twining their fingers together as they meandered along the sidewalk toward the Parker household. “Riley, I…holy crap, I feel like I understand you _so_ much better now. You used to be a boy, or…you _remember_ being a boy, but you’re a girl now, and…the boy you used to be still _exists_ , but it’s not actually you, but _you’re_ the one that’s not actually _him_ , and…. This is so wild, and now I understand why you’re always a little bit mopey, I guess.”

 

“Mopey?” Riley asked, and Julie smiled at the almost-but-not-really offended look she got.

 

“Just a little,” she said in a soothing tone. “But, Riley, I…I get it now. You’re sort of on a constant existential crisis, and that’s gotta be a whole lot of not fun.”

 

Riley let a breathy laugh through her nose, nodding. “Well, you’re right about that.”

 

“Hey,” Julie said, pulling her to a stop. “Riley, listen, okay? Listening?”

 

“Listening,” Riley said, and Julie smiled up at her, pouring all of the affection she could muster into the expression and words she spoke next.

 

“Riley, you are the best thing that has ever happened to me, okay?” she asked. “Without you, I’d…probably still be just another confused teenage girl trying to deny the fact that she might be into girls. But…you sort of forced me acknowledge that, because…Riley, I’m so into you. I’m unbelievably into you. So, I don’t care if you’re a clone or…some kind of alien or whatever. Whatever you think, _my_ world is a better place because of _you_.”

 

Riley bit her lip, smiling as her eyes shone a bit. A couple of tears ran down her cheeks and Julie hastened to wipe them away. “You’re making me cry, and I hate that,” Riley said, earning a small bubble of laughter from Julie.

 

“Riley, look,” she said. “We can go after this guy. If you want, we can. I’ll help, I’ll follow every step of the way. But I just don’t want you feel like you need to…I dunno, justify your existence or anything. I’ll do that _for_ you, all day, every day.”

 

Riley smiled down at her, leaning in and pressing their foreheads together. Her eyes darted around Julie’s face, resting on her mouth (Julie thought/hoped), her eyes, her mouth again, and then her eyes one last time. Mustering up her courage, Julie took a deep breath and close the gap between their lips.

 

The kiss was short and sweet, neither of them caring to linger in passionate embrace on a rather public street in Queens, but it was all the pair needed in that moment, Julie wanting to assure Riley that everything was completely more than okay between them and Riley just looking for someone that wanted _her_ and only her. When they parted, Riley had a grin on her face, and Julie felt her own lips spreading in a wide smile at the expression.

 

“I hate to knock off John Green here, but…okay?” Julie asked, and Riley snickered.

 

“Okay,” she said, wrapping an arm around Julie’s shoulders and leading her toward the house. “For real, though, I hated that book.”

 

“No!” Julie gasped. “I cried!”

 

“The only book I could stand from him was _An Abundance of Katherines_ ,” Riley said, and Julie just huffed.

 

“That one was alright,” she admitted. “But how did you not cry in _Looking for Alaska_ , when she died and – “

 

“No, see, that’s why I stopped reading it,” Riley said, shaking her head. “That was just _too_ much of a downer for me. I lost all interest in the rest of the book.”  


“You like when it’s a happy ending and the hero ends up with the girl,” Julie observed with a little smile, and Riley shrugged.

 

“I’m a hopeless romantic, I guess,” she said, earning a little giggle from Julie.

 

“That’s actually really cute,” she said as the pair reached the little cement path leading up to Riley’s house. Julie hugged onto her girlfriend (probably, hopefully) and looked up at her. “Anything I should know before meeting this famous Aunt May?”

 

“Just be yourself, and she’ll love you,” Riley insisted, and Julie took a deep breath. Aunt May was a conundrum. She was inexorably involved in their Neighborhood Watch business by virtue of having raised Peter and (by extension) Riley, but she also was living a sort of carefully-constructed lie, thinking Peter was just really involved in some internship at Oscorp and Riley was an estranged cousin of Pete’s that found herself with nowhere else to go but them.

 

It was a weird, delicate balance that had to be maintained for fear of ruining poor Aunt May’s sensibilities.

 

The woman herself greeted them as the stepped over the threshold into the Parker household, bustling about with some sort of oldies band playing. Julie wanted to guess the Monkees? Maybe –

 

“The Beatles?” Riley asked as they shut the door behind them. “Aunt May must be in ‘serious business’ mode. She only breaks out Rubber Soul when she’s in a hurry.”

 

“Oh, Riley, dear,” Aunt May said as she came into view, hauling a suitcase that she settled onto the dining room table with a loud _clunk_ sound. “Hello, there.”

 

“Um…Aunt May, are you going somewhere?” Riley asked in evident confusion.

 

“Just to a company retreat upstate,” Aunt May said with a smile. “I won’t be gone but a day or so. You won’t miss me too much, will you?”

 

“Aunt May, every moment you’re gone is just agony,” Riley said with mock earnestness, and Aunt May smiled at her, making her way over and giving Riley a gentle smack on the head with a hotel pamphlet she was holding.

 

“You have been spending far too much time around your cousin,” she said, and Riley just smirked.

 

“No, I’m serious,” she insisted. “What will I without your home-cooked meals and constant house-cleaning binges? This place is gonna be a disaster when you get back.”

 

“Well,” Aunt May said with a secretive little smile, “I suppose I’ll just have to blame Peter, won’t I? We ladies have to stick together, after all.”

 

Riley snorted out a little laugh. “I’m gonna hold you to that when you get back and this place is a disaster,” she said. “I’ll do my best, but a woman’s touch can only do so much.”

 

“Don’t I know that,” Aunt May grumbled. “Alright, dear, I’m actually on my way out the door, but I’m glad I got to catch you before I left. You behave, and if you have any parties, you’d best just have everything ship-shape before I get back, and don’t you get up to anything too dangerous.”

 

“You’re seriously the coolest legal guardian I’ve ever had,” Riley said, and Aunt May, grinned, reaching out to pull Riley into a little one-armed hug.

 

“If I ever have to get another job, that’s going right on my résumé,” she said. “’Coolest legal guardian ever.’ I might have a t-shirt made up.”

 

“If you do, I expect you to wear it as often as possible,” Riley said with a smile. “You should have like five or six made, so you never have to go without one.”

 

“You are just a loon,” Aunt May chuckled, shaking her head. “Alright, love, I’m off. You kids be good, and don’t you burn this place down while I’m gone.”

 

“No promises,” Riley said, and Aunt May just rolled her eyes, hefting her suitcase and making for the door. Julie hurried to hold the door for her, and Aunt May smiled as she passed by.

 

“Thank you, dear,” she said, heading for her car. The pair waved her off as she tossed her suitcase in the trunk and climbed into the driver’s seat, sending them a wave as she started up the car and pulled away, off into the night.

 

“Party at your place?” Julie asked, and Riley sighed.

 

“Knowing Harry Osborn, most likely.”

 

……

 

“PARTY AT PARKER’S!” Harry says as he bursts into _my_ home, holding his arms up in a triumphant pose. Jubilee follows behind with a sheepish expression, smiling reluctantly at me.

 

“Pete, I’m so sorry,” she says. “I really tried to talk him out of it, but – “

 

“It’s alright,” I insist. “This…might even be just what the team needs. Honestly, most of the weird shit Harry comes up with ends up turning out for the best, so I guess we can let this slide.”

 

“I guess…” Jubilee says reluctantly.

 

“But I want like full team of high-priced cleaners to come in tomorrow and fix this place up,” I say, and Harry snickers, coming over to wrap me in a hug.

 

“Dude, what do you think the first thing I did before we headed over here was?” he asks. “I’ve got a fucking multi-million-dollar Chameleon bot cleaning crew on standby to rebuild this house from the ground up. No matter what our epic party does to this house, Aunt May will have no idea, and that’s an Osborn promise.”

 

“That…actually goes a long way toward making me feel better about this whole thing,” I admit, and Harry nods solemnly.

 

“Dude, you are my brother from another mother, Pete,” he insists. “You and Gwen and Riley are like…. You’re all my family. I may be full-on young and reckless, but I clean up after my rich-boy messes, right?”

 

I roll my eyes, but I can’t deny that Harry is not at all shy about throwing Norman Osborn’s money at the problems he makes, and Norman doesn’t even seem to mind it. It’s probably their own strange way of bonding. Norman’s a busy guy and isn’t always there in the way most fathers are conventionally, but if he can throw his money Harry’s indulgences, that’s a small bit of consolation.

 

On retrospect, maybe it’s not the healthiest father-son relationship, but the sentiment is there, right?

 

“Alright, party at my place,” I say, and Harry grins, clapping me on the shoulders.

 

“Dude, this is gonna be the most epic stereotypical teenage summer party of all time, I swear,” Harry insists.

 

“Just…promise me we’ll keep the alcohol thing to an understandable minimum?” I ask.

 

……

 

“My name is Eugene Thompson, and I am fucking shitfaced!” Flash yells to the party at large, most of whom cheer jubilantly as Flash downs yet another Mike’s Hard Lemonade, having never cared for beer, he says. He staggers away from what has been dubbed The Stage, which is in fact my back porch but is enough of a platform to have been rechristened and given the dubious honor of being the place where party guests make outrageous announcements before chugging down whatever alcoholic beverage they’re toting.

 

“Choice declaration, Flash,” Bobby says as Flash staggers into him, finishing his drink and tossing the bottle into the barrel that accounts for a garbage bucket in the backyard.

 

“Hey, sometimes confessions aren’t about substance, they’re about presentation,” Flash says with a chuckle. “Don’t act like you weren’t impressed.”

 

“Bro, I am suitably impressed by everything you do,” Bobby says with a grin. “Now, why don’t we go settle down and maybe lay off the alcohol for a bit?”

 

“But…feedback,” Flash groaned. “I’m just a poor mutant that needs constant reassurance. What if no one found my Stage performance engaging?”

 

“Do you want me to take you somewhere private and stroke your ego?” Bobby asks with a smirk. “I totally will.”

 

“The innuendo,” Lana says as the two stagger away toward the house, where a spirited game of Smash is being played. “It burns.”

 

“If Flash and Bobby turn out to be totally gay for each other, I wouldn’t even mind,” I say, and Lana giggles against me. Peer pressure found me downing a few drinks of my own, and I’m currently lounging across a couch we bought several hours ago from a nearby Goodwill store, carried home invisibly thanks to Johnny, and set up in the backyard for optimal outdoor comfort. Most of the party is happening indoors, with the backyard serving as a sort of retreat from the loud music and boisterous video-gaming. Lana found me several minutes ago and draped herself on top of me, snuggling against me and vowing to keep me safe from any party-going ne’er-do-wells.

 

“For real, that would actually be sort of awesome,” she says in a sleepy voice, wiggling against me in the most enticing of ways to plant a kiss right on my lips. I’m almost inclined to tell her that we should probably still be making an effort to keep a low profile with this polyamory thing, but her soft weight against me and gentle feel of her lips pressing to mine is too amazing to protest at the moment.

 

“Sit up,” Kitty’s voice says from nearby, her small hands pushing on my shoulders to lift me into a sitting position. She wiggles onto the couch behind me so I’m leaning against her, head pillowed on her tummy while she toys with my hair. “Hm…you know, the first time I saw you without your mask on, I was like ‘I bet his hair is so soft’, and I was right.”

 

“You’ve adjusted to this whole setup fairly well,” I say, and Kitty shrugs, leaning down to plant a soft kiss to my lips.

 

“My life has never really been conventional,” she says. “Why should my love life be?”

 

“Fair point,” I tell her, and she giggles, leaning down to plant another little kiss, letting a happy little murmuring sound.

 

“So, we’re just taking this whole thing public?” I ask, looking between the two of them, and they both shrug.

 

“It’s a party, everyone’s feeling a little toasty, why shouldn’t you cuddle up on a couch in your backyard with two girls?” Kitty asks.

 

“And make out with them,” Lana adds, stealing a little kiss.

 

“So much making out,” Kitty agrees with a giggle, running her hands down my shoulders and over my chest. Her huge brown eyes glitter with affection as she smiles down at me. “If anyone has a problem with it, so what?”

 

“Oh my gosh,” Gwen says, strolling over and smirking when she sees us. “MJ, Jess, found him! Come look at this.”

 

MJ and Jess stroll over to see me sandwiched between the two girls, Kitty still running her hands in slow circles over my chest, Lana apparently dozing a bit against me.

 

“That is the cutest thing I’ve ever seen,” Jess says with a giggle, pulling out her phone to snap a picture. Gwen settles down on the grass near my head, leaning against Kitty’s side and smiling at me.

 

“So, um…I guess you can tell we’ve decided to be a bit less secretive about this whole thing,” she says softly.

 

“You guys really _do_ have some kind of Circle of Girlfriends or something,” I say, shaking my head. “I knew it.”

 

“I mean, okay, we do have…chats from time to time,” she says. “Keep everyone on the same page, make sure no one feels neglected. For the most part, we just let it happen, you know?”

 

“I’m still just…mind-blown that you came up with this and made it work,” I admit, and Gwen just giggles, nuzzling her nose against mine before kissing me softly. “You’re pretty amazing.”

 

“You really are, Gwen,” Kitty says, still running her fingers through her hair. “For real, it can’t have been easy to decide to share your boyfriend with a bunch of girls that are into him in a huge way.”

 

“It…wasn’t, really,” Gwen admits with a smile, shrugging. “But…you all have a really good reason for liking him, and I was like…that’s the kind of love you spend your life trying to recapture, but it’s a longshot, you know?”

 

“I like this,” Jess says, sitting next to Gwen and leaning against her while MJ settles on her other side. “I have four best friends, and we all share a boyfriend and kind of work together to keep it working.”

  
“Mmmit’s pretty great,” Lana mutters in a half-asleep daze, nuzzling into my chest. “I don’t really know how to have like a normal relationship, so I have you guys to help me not be a total fuck-up.”

 

I reach down and gently rub at her back, and she gives a contented little sigh, slumping into me once more.

  
“Can we just stay out here forever?” Kitty asks, and Lana nods against my stomach.

 

“I honestly wouldn’t mind that,” MJ admits. “Sounds like they’re on round three of drinks, and that’s usually when Rock Band starts.”

 

“Ew, Flash Thompson karaoke is not something I wanna relive,” Gwen says with a snort. “Hey, why don’t we sneak off to Pete’s room? There’s a door on the side of the house.”

 

“Oh, sneaking into my boyfriend’s room?” Kitty asks with an impish smirk down at me, leaning down for another small kiss. “How scandalous.”

 

……

 

“I have to say, the highlight of that party was May Parker getting smashed and climbing onto a table to sing along with Stevie Nicks,” Alison said as May led the way into Oscorp. “And making eyes at that guy with the hors d'oeuvres? You got his number, didn’t you?”

 

“Oh, heavens, no,” May chuckled “He’s much too young for this old girl.”

 

“’Old girl’, listen to yourself,” Barb said as they walked through the building, bound for the car park. They had driven their vehicles to the Oscorp building and then all hopped on a shuttle bus to the actual event, and now it was just a quick pit stop, and then May would be on her way home to assess the damage of whatever party Peter had doubtless thrown with his friends.

 

Still, it was nice that he was making so many new friends, and he seemed to be in such good spirits lately. She might bluster for a few minutes, but Peter would say something to ease the tension, and she would just insist that he clean up whatever mess was left over.

 

“I’m sixty-three years old, Barbara,” May said with a smile. “And I spent most of that time married to the most wonderful man in the world. I don’t think I’m ready to hit the dating scene again.”

 

“Just flirting with servers at fancy business parties, right?” Alison asked, and May winked at her.

 

“Well, I suppose it doesn’t hurt to see if I’ve still got it,” she said, prompting both girls to cackle with laughter. They reached the elevator that would take them to the parking garage, and Alison tapped the button to call it. They waited near the doors, looking around the lobby as the elevator slowly made its way down to them. Even on the weekend, scientists still bustled from floor to floor, either for that sweet overtime pay or simply because for them, business _was_ pleasure.

 

Would Peter be one of those kinds someday, spending all of his time at work for the sole reason that he loved his job that much? No doubt Gwen would have to drag him away, or any of the other girls he spent so much time with lately. Aunt May was sure there was a story there, but wasn’t inclined to pry about something that so obviously made all of them happy.

 

Her thoughts were jerked back to the present by the strangest sequence of noises she’d ever heard while at work.

 

_Ding!_

_Ker-CRASH!_

_Juuuung-SHOOM!_

 

A blast of hot air sent May stumbling toward the elevator as it opened, she the other two girls quickly hurrying as the doors closed. As the lobby disappeared behind the doors, she caught sight of a huge armored figure and three men looming through the smoke billowing through a massive hole that had been blown in the front wall. Alarms sounded and panicked yells reached their ears before being cut off as the doors sealed.

 

“ _A security breach has occurred on the ground floor_ ,” Jarvis told them, perhaps a bit redundantly. “ _For your safety, you will be taken to the tenth floor, where a specially trained disaster response agent will lead you to an evacuation site. Please remain calm and follow instructions as they are given_.”

 

The elevator door opened, but the sight that greeted them was not a waiting agent, but two men in some kind of fight. One of them was wearing a jumpsuit with the Oscorp logo on it, but the other was wearing some kind of tactical military gear and a disturbing skull mask.

 

“Please keep your distance while I subdue this man!” the agent said, running and lunging at the skulled man with a punch, be he dodged it effortlessly, slipping and ducking away from every one of the agent’s well-coordinated moves. Finally, when the agent showed no signs of tiring, the other man simply grabbed his arm, slamming him against the wall and placing a gun to his head.

 

“I know a robot when I see one,” he said, unloading a round into the agent’s head, then his chest, then his stomach, sending him crumpling to the ground. “Not sure where you keep your brain or whatever, but from the look of things, I got it. You three.” He held his gun out. “I’m gonna need hostages. You come with me.”

 

……

 

“Alright, who’s _coming with me_!?” I yell expectantly as I stride through the house, Riley already on my heels. “ _We are gone in two minutes, with or with you guys_!”

 

“We’re coming,” Jess says, my five girls heading up from the basement, already in costume. Julie makes her way downstairs from where she and Riley spent most of the party holed up and…well, probably doing the same thing I was doing in the basement.

 

I don’t have time for fond memories or hungover friends, though, and it looks like most of the rest of the Watch is out of commission, having partied a little too hard last night.

 

Perfect timing. Oscorp is being attacked, Aunt May is being held hostage according to Jarvis’s security footage, and we’re down half the Watch.

 

“ _Fuck it, we’re out_ ,” I say, hurrying for the door. “ _Shadowcat, hop –_ “

 

I don’t even have to finish, Kitty latching onto my back even, and I feel her weight lessen until she’s barely there, my newest girlfriend altering her density for easier movement.

 

“Did you call Miles?” she asks as we take off, leaping onto a rooftop and darting toward Manhattan.

 

“ _He’s inbound_ ,” I say. “ _They’re closer, actually, so they might get there before us_.”

 

……

 

“ _So, what’s the situation_?” Ganke asked as he and Miles swung around a corner, Cindy and Alex right behind them.

 

“ _Peter needs us_ ,” I say. “ _His aunt is in there, and she’s been taken hostage_.”

 

“ _Oh, no_ ,” Cindy said. “ _Do we know who it is_?”

 

“ _Security footage says a guy in a giant mech-suit like the Rhino’s and two others in like low-tech battle armor or something_ ,” Miles said. “ _And there’s a fourth guy on the tenth floor, but that glass is hella strong. We’ll need to –_ “

 

“ _Uh, looks like Spidey’s got that covered_ ,” Alex said, and they all looked up to see Peter swinging toward the building with Kitty on his back, and Miles winced at the expected collision…except it never came. They zipped right through the glass without a mark.

 

“ _Oh, right_ ,” he said. “ _Phasing powers_.”

 

“ _Let’s focus up, alright_?” Cindy said as they landed on the side of a building opposite Oscorp. At the entrance, a rampaging metal giant was wrecking the lobby, smashing walls, and picking up cop cars, tossing them around like toys. Two metal horns protruded from the side of the armor, giving him a look like a bull or an ox. Coming up to his knees, his companions look miniscule compared to him, wearing armor that looked actually very similar to Harry’s old Silver Surfer design. One was wielding two fairly normal-looking guns, but the other had a long whip that was glowing with energy. “ _Phage, why don’t you and I handle the big guy? Miles, you get the one with the whip, since you have the leg power. Alex, you get the one with the guns_.”

 

“ _Let’s do this_ ,” Miles said, leaping down and webbing into the scene. His spider-sense buzzed faintly as the whip guy took notice of him, clanging much more loudly as he reared back the glowing lariat and sent it at Miles, but he simply leaped away and zipped in close. Peter once told him that he suspected Miles had been bitten by some kind of jumping spider, as his legs were insanely powerful, to the point that he had tailored his fighting style to be more about punching, lest his super-powered kicks kill someone accidentally.

 

_Fzzzzt-TACK!_

 

Miles zipped away from another lashing strike, ducking under the whip and closing the distance enough to land a solid punch on the guy’s chest. He flew back, rolling and springing to his feet with a smirk.

 

“Well, well, Spider-Man and his pals show up not five minutes after we get here,” he said. “I knew you was working with Oscorp.”

 

“ _Or maybe we just got here fast because of your big metal guy there_?” Miles asked, squaring off with his foe, who he decided he was going to be called Whiplash, simply because it sounded like a good name for a bad guy. He could dodge away from the whip easily enough, but he couldn’t get close enough to land a hit while it was flying around, not without some real finesse. “ _He’s kinda making a scene, you know_?”

 

Nearby, Ganke and Cindy were hanging on for dear life as the Ox attempted to buck them, taking every opportunity they could to web him to the street, to walls, to himself, but he had some kind of knockoff repulsors, because every time they managed to stick him down, he just fired off a shot and got free. Alex, meanwhile, was chasing down the one with the guns, who had managed to put the Ox between himself and his pursuer.

 

Spider-sense!

 

_Fzzzt-TACK!_

 

Miles just managed to leap away, soaring into the air as Whiplash’s whip hit the ground where he had been. Thinking quickly, he aimed his hands down.

 

_Thwip-thwip!_

 

His webbing stuck the whip to the ground…for about two seconds.

 

_Fzzzt!_

 

The whip powered up, vaporizing the webbing, and Miles had just enough time to latch onto a stoplight and swing away as the whip snapped up at him. A shot of pain lanced across his back, and he grunted, falling out of the air as his body seized up, flying solidly into the Ox.

 

_Juuung-SHOOM!_

 

A blast of painfully hot energy sent him flying away again, and he heard a strangled yell.

 

“ _Shit, SHIT_!” Ganke yelled, and as Miles fell, he felt a set of arms gripping onto him, a small snapping as his momentum changed, and he was set onto shaky feet. His vision cleared a bit, and he registered Ganke’s mask staring at him. “ _Bro, talk to me. How many fingers am I holding up_?”

 

“ _You’re not holding up_ any _fingers, dumbass_ ,” Miles said, and Ganke chuckled, clapping him on the shoulders.

 

“ _That was a test_ ,” he insisted. “ _You passed. C’mon, let’s get back in it, but you stick close to me. I’ll handle the whip guy_.”

 

“ _I was thinking we call him Whiplash_ ,” Miles pointed out. Ganke made a small noise of approval.

 

“ _I like it_ ,” he said. “ _Alright, let’s kick Whiplash in his whip-ass_.”

 

“ _Two out of ten_ ,” Miles said as they webbed back to the scene.

 

“ _Nah, that’s a solid six, maybe even seven_ ,” Ganke said. “ _You take Ox, I’ll handle Whiplash_.”

 

Miles nodded as he flew into Ox, landing with his feet planted solidly in the armored man’s chest. Pushing off with all his might, he flew away, the extra-strong force of his legs sending Ox falling onto his back, where he began to struggle and thrash, trying to stand again.

 

“Gah, what the fuck!” Ox yelled. “Montana, I’m stuck! This fucking suit can’t stand up.”

 

“You’re gonna have to figure that one out yourself, Ox,” Whiplash said, brandishing his whip. “You kids get the hell back! Ox, blast ‘em!”

 

“Oh, right!”

 

Spider-sense!

 

_Juuung-SHOOM!_

 

Ox’s armor was sent flying into a roll as a blast of energy tore open another hole in the front of the building. Norman Osborn better have a damn good insurance policy on this place.

 

“Hey, I can’t believe that worked!” Ox said, back on his feet again. He punched his metal fists together and swiped a foot across the ground. “Bring it!”

 

He tore at them, and Ganke shouted at Miles.

 

“ _Ricochet, zappy hands_!” he said. “ _If we all hit him at once_ – “

 

“ _Let’s try it_!” Miles said, and they all converged upon the Ox, flailed wildly as he was spider-piled.

 

_Zzzzzzzt-SHAAAAAFFFF!_

 

“Nyaaagh!” Ox shouted, his suit whirring loudly before several loud pops came from along his limbs as the circuitry was overloaded, sparking and billowing out clouds of smoke. He seized up, the heavy armor no longer assisted by the hydraulics, and toppled over.

 

“ _Hell yeah_!” Ganke said, glancing around. “ _Hey, wait, where’s Whiplash_?”

 

They all scanned the area, but there was no sign of their whip-wielding foe, only a sea of police cars and officers now swarming the Ox suit.

 

“ _I don’t believe it_ ,” Miles said. “ _He ran. What kinda guy –_ “

 

_Crash!_

 

They all looked up to see a commotion happening ten stories up. A crumpled mass of metal flew out of the building, a glittering shower of glass falling in its wake. Reacting quickly, Miles leapt, soaring up eight floors or so and crawling the rest of the way. As he drew closer, he could scarcely believe his eyes.

 

Spider-Man, Peter Parker, was dangling a man out of a window, his mask off, his face twisted in the purest expression of rage Miles had ever seen.

 

“Ah!” the man yelled. “Holy shit, man, I-I’m sorry!”

 

“NOW YOU’RE SORRY!?” Peter yelled, shaking him. “No, no, you’ll be when you’re about six floors down. Now, I’m going to ask, and you are going to answer. Who sent you today?”

 

“Frederick Foswell!” the man yelled. “He-he works for the Kingpin! He wanted to…to send a message! Shit, man, don’t kill me!”

 

“I’m not gonna kill you,” Peter said, and the man sighed in relief. “The impact probably will.”

 

“What—hey, hey aaaagh, fuck!” the man shouted as Peter dropped him, and Miles could only stare in shock. Peter didn’t even stay to watch the fall, just leapt out of the hole he’d made, pulling his mask back on and swinging away, his cousin Riley hot on his heels.

 

“ _Scarlet_!” Julie shouted as she dashed up to the hole. Over their intercom, Riley’s voice came, flat and determined.

 

“ _Don’t follow us_ ,” she said. Miles watched in utter shock as they swung away, Cindy crawling up with the man Peter had dropped, having caught him a few stories down. He was whimpering and shaking but mostly unharmed. Miles turned to Julie, who was leaning against a wall inside the building, also shaking.

 

“ _What the fuck happened_?” he asked.

 

……

 

**Minutes Earlier**

 

“ _Phase us in_ ,” I say, and I feel the slight tingle of intangibility. Thankfully, Kitty’s been practicing, and her phasing doesn’t disrupt electronics unless she actually passes through them, so my gear survives the trip through the glass unharmed. We land, and Kitty drops to her feet next to me. “ _Athena, heat signatures_?”

 

“ _Four—heat signatures—located_ ,” Athena says, and four dots appear on my HUD. I lead Kitty down a hall, speaking quietly.

 

“ _Surveillance on the floor_?” I ask. Abruptly a new voice speaks in my ear.

 

“ _Hello, Mr. Parker_ ,” Jarvis says. “ _Forgive the intrusion; I’ve synchronized myself with your communications array and your graphic overlay_.”

 

“ _Jarvis, is Aunt May okay_?” I ask immediately.

 

“ _May Parker, Barbara Gordon, and Alison Maxwell are being held hostage by an assailant that matches the description of the mercenary known as Taskmaster_ ,” Jarvis says. “ _Little is known about him other than the fact that he is an exceptionally-skilled hand-to-hand combatant_.”

 

“Should we bring backup, you think?” Kitty asks, and I shake my head.

 

“ _Too many people might spook him_ ,” I say. “ _Anyway, the rest of the Watch needs to get this place evacuated in case that Ox guy causes some kind of collapse or they make their way into the building._ ”

 

“What’s the plan, then?” Kitty asks, and I sigh, shaking my head.

 

“ _I don’t know_ ,” I admit. “ _I can’t…. I mean, negotiate, probably. Find out what he wants and…give it to him_.”

 

“Where’s Tony?” Kitty asks. “Couldn’t he help?”

 

“ _He’s still off at that conference thing_ ,” I say. “ _The higher-ups had to stay an extra day or something_.”

 

We reach the door that the heat signatures are behind, and I yell through it.

 

“ _Taskmaster! This is Spider-Man! I’m here with Shadowcat! Tell us what you want, and no one has to get hurt, right_?”

 

The door opens just as I finish my statement, and Taskmaster himself comes strolling out. I feel a rush of anger stronger than any I’ve ever felt when I see that he has a gun pointed at Aunt May’s head, his arm pinning her in place.

 

“ _Let her go_ ,” I say. “ _I’m here, you don’t need her_.”

 

Taskmaster surveys us, glaring at Kitty.

 

“She leaves,” he says with a nod at her. “Just you and me.”

 

I nod, turning to Kitty. “ _Go help Widow with the evacuation. Tell them to stay away from this floor_.”

 

“But – “

 

“ _Go_ ,” I say. Kitty huffs behind her mask, sinking through the floor and out of sight.

 

“This isn’t how I wanted this go down, Spider-Man,” Taskmaster says as she leaves. “I wasn’t expecting you to get here so quickly. I guess you and Oscorp really _are_ pals. I just wanted to find out a few things about you, take them back to my boss.”

 

Can I get the gun away from him? Even as fast as I am, one wrong move, and he pulls the trigger, and…. No, I have to play his game for a bit, hope he drops his guard.

 

“ _What kind of things_?” I ask, and he chuckles.

 

“The kind of stuff that makes it really easy for him to convince you to give up this superhero gig,” he says. “You been rustling a lot of jimmies, kid. They’re ready to rustle back.”

 

In the distance, I hear a soft ding, and time seems to slow down as a man comes running around the corner. He looks like one of the guys I saw out front, one of the attackers. He says something to Taskmaster, but it’s enough to draw the merc’s attention away from Aunt May for just a moment.

 

A moment is all I need.

 

_Thwip-thwip!_

 

I yank Aunt May away from his grip with one web, the other tugging Taskmaster’s arm away to release his hold on her. Aunt May soars toward me with a shout of alarm, and I grip her, sending her hurrying down the hall.

 

“ _Find cover_!” I shout at her, my spider-sense buzzing, and I dodge a hit from Taskmaster, ducking under his swing. He swipes at me again, and move to pull the same dodge, but I have to sort of twist away as he swipes a kick at my escape route, instead climbing over him and pressing my hand to his skull.

 

_Zzzt-SHAFF!_

 

He staggers but doesn’t fall, spinning a kick at me, the new guy taking the occasional potshot with his guns when he can. Keep them away from the room, away from the hall where Aunt May is hiding. I duck and dodge away from his attacks, but I keep having to change things up, as he always seems to be ready to stop my dodges. I tend to move where my spider-sense takes me, but there’s apparently a pattern, and this guy is learning it. Thankfully, spider-sense is good at compensation, warning me when he’s about to intercept me after the _first_ warning. The constant buzzing is a little annoying, and the world seems to spin around me as I move circles around Taskmaster. I need to get him on the defensive, but every time I start to, he just dodges away again. I leap back, taking half a second to size him up. One solid hit, that’s all I need. I’m strong enough to lift a few tons; the only thing stopping me from exerting that much effort in actual fights is my own desire not to dismember common thugs with my fists.

 

This guy, though…this guy threatened Aunt May.

 

Bracing my feet, I leap at him with all the speed I can muster, and he does the same, much more slowly, though. He’s highly-trained, but they call me a superhero for a reason. I am rather super. I rear back my right fist, but he’s ready to block it. I’m ready for that _block_ , though, gripping his arm instead and grabbing the scruff of his shirt, slamming him into a wall hard enough to crack the wall and send his mask askew. Rearing back, I give him one more good crack, hearing a satisfying crunch of drywall as his mask falls away. I toss him behind me and web him to the floor.

 

“ _Now for you_ ,” I say, turning to the gunman, who just holds out his two handguns.

 

“Hey, you stay back,” he says. “You just…you stay back!”

 

He fires a couple of rounds, which I dodge, closing the distance faster than he can probably follow. After the Taskmaster, this guy’s a chump, and one solid punch stuns him enough for me to grip his hands and web them behind his back. Sighing, I turn toward the direction I sent Aunt May.

 

It takes me a second to register what I see, because it’s just so unbelievable, so not at all what I was expecting, that I think I might be hallucinating at first. I blink, but there it still is, my nightmare made real, the Worst Case Scenario.

 

Aunt May is staggering toward me, her shirt stained with blood, hands clutched over her chest. Her eyes are wide with shock, staring at me disbelievingly like she’s asking me to tell her that what just happened didn’t happen, that there’s no way she just got shot, just like that.

 

I wish I could say so.

 

“ _No…_ ” I mutter, shaking my head, whipping my mask off and hurrying over as she starts to crumple. I catch her, and she feels so limp, so frail in my arms. “No, no, Aunt May. Aunt May, stay with me, c’mon.”

 

“Peter…?” she asks, her voice worryingly weak. “Peter? Spider-Man?”

 

“It’s me, Aunt May, I’m…I’m here,” I tell her. “It’s…it’s been me the whole time, but…. But you…you gotta stay with me, alright?” I look up to see the two other women that were taken hurrying from the room, staring at us in shock. “Call an ambulance…. Jarvis!”

 

“ _Medical personnel is on the way_ ,” Jarvis says. The elevator dings, and seconds later, Riley and Julie are hurrying around the corner, Riley stopping dead at the sight that greets her.

 

“Spider-Man…” Aunt May says with a little smile up at me, reaching a hand up, and I take it, pressing it to my face. “Your uncle must be so proud. I…I can’t wait to tell him….”

 

“You’ll _have_ to wait, Aunt May,” I say. “C’mon, you can’t…. You’re not leaving yet.”

 

“What happened?” Julie asks, Riley kneeling next to us and pulling her own mask away, her face a snarled twist of the same emotions that are probably swirling around my head right now.

 

“Look at you two,” Aunt May says with a smile. “Superheroes.”

 

“Hang in there, Aunt May,” Riley says, her voice shaky as she inspects the damage. I’m no doctor, but I know that that the bullet hit much too close to her heart and she’s lost a lot of blood already. It probably hit an artery.

 

I know hitting an artery is bad news.

 

“I’m going…to see…Ben,” Aunt May says, smiling. “You two…so proud…. I’m so…prou….”

 

Her eyelids droop, her gaze going glassy. Her hand is limp in mine, cold.

 

I slowly lower her to the floor, standing, my breath coming in short, shaky gasps. There’s a rushing in my ears, and I feel my heartbeat filling my entire being, pounding as I turn toward the webbed up man in the corner. He looks up at me, and the look of terror he gives me is one of the most rewarding things I’ve ever seen in my life. I charge over and grip him by the scruff, lifting him easily. Riley seems to read my intentions as I drag him kicking and shouting toward the window Kitty and I phased through earlier. Grabbing a table from a nearby office and dragging it ahead of us, she tosses it at the window hard enough that the table crumples, but the glass just shatters, flying outward. Dragging our new friend along, I thrust him out the window.

 

We’re getting answers.

 

And someone’s going to pay.


	13. Chapter 13

 Felicia sighed, leaning on the bar. She spent most of her time at the Black Cat maintaining finances and scouting out new locations to pursue her little “hobby”, but sometimes she liked to just work the bar, serve up drinks, watch the nightlife go by. It reminded her of the old days, when Daddy would do the same while Felicia spun away on the farthest bar stool, watching him meet with contacts, discuss deals, and do his small part in making sure New York stayed interesting. Sometimes, he would even pat the stool in front of him when his various contacts left, and Felicia would hop up while they discussed the meeting. Felicia quickly learned what to look out for, visual cues, vocal tones, mannerisms that gave away a bluff or when there was more information to be gained. By the time he had passed, Felicia had been ready to strike out on her own, carrying on the Black Cat legacy in her own way.

 

Tonight, though, there were no meetings to be had, no contacts to meet with. As much as she liked the Spider-Kids and their Neighborhood watch, traffic had slowed considerably, at least in regards to the more illicit side of New York. Strangely, this had the unanticipated side-effect of a much more hopping club life in their little neighborhood. The dance floor was rather consistently more packed than it had ever been, and drink sales were nearly doubled now that people believe the streets to be safer.

 

Heck, she might even be able to go straight, make a decent honest living running a nightclub.

 

But where would the fun be in that?

 

_Speaking of fun…look who just walked in…._

 

“Felicia,” her favorite little spider said as he made his way over and sat on the stool opposite her, his adorable female double sitting next to him.

 

“Well, well, you two,” she said. “I didn’t expect to see you come through until you’d cleaned up the city and had no one else to pick on but me.”

 

When that didn’t even garner a small smile, she blinked, looking between them. They looked…awful, upon closer inspection. There were tired bags under their eyes and twin dour expressions that just didn’t belong their youthful faces. Their eyes, though…Felicia shivered at the way such baby-blue eyes could freeze over with such determination.

 

There was a cold fire in those eyes, and God help whoever they were looking to burn with it.

 

“We’re kind of just here on…business,” Peter said, and Felicia nodded.

 

“Did something happen?” she asked. Peter just blinked, both of their expressions hardening.

 

“What do you know about Frederick Foswell?” Riley asked in a low voice. Felicia quirked an eyebrow, taking a quick glance around the bar. No one was within earshot, and the dance floor was pretty hopping, so it was unlikely they would be overheard. Not that many of the Kingpin’s lackey’s came around here. He and Felicia tended to stay firmly out of each other’s business.

 

“I know he’s pretty much the Kingpin’s right-hand man,” she said, resting her elbow on the bar and her chin in her hand. “I know he was asking around a little while back for some toughs to help him with a job.”

 

“Do you know where he might be?” Peter asked. “Anywhere he like goes a lot?”

 

“Restaurants?” Riley asked.

 

“What kind of car he drives?”

 

“Woah, calm down,” Felicia said with a small smile, tapping the earpiece she was wearing. “Actually…. Max, you there?”

 

“ _For you, Felicia_?” Max said. “ _Always_.”

 

“Come in here a sec,” Felicia said. “Some friends of mine have some questions about an old friend of yours.”

 

……

 

“Should we really be doing this when two of our friends are in jail?” Montana asked, and Frederick just sighed.

 

“They knew what they were signing on for,” Frederick said as they headed for his car. “Fisk isn’t really happy with any of us after we botched the Osborn thing, so we’re just gonna lay low, and when he needs something, we knock it out of the park and spin an early release for Ox and Dan.”

 

“It just feels…rotten,” Montana said, climbing into the driver’s seat. “I ran away from the fight, I left my brothers to get captured. I’m not any kinda man.”

 

“Hey, you wanna organize some kinda breakout on your own, you knock yourself out,” Frederick said. “Just leave me out of it. I’ll have no part of it.”

 

They took off, spending most of the rest of the drive in silence, and Frederick took the time to mull over his predicament. There had only been one death in the entire operation, some old woman that worked as a janitor, and Oscorp and Spidey didn’t appear to be intimidated as much as they just seemed pissed at their gall. The Neighborhood Watch hadn’t stopped at all in the past few days, in fact ramping up their attention to _every_ one of the families. The Maggia, the Kingpin’s empire, even up-and-comers like the Torino Family and the Queen of Crime weren’t exempt. Add this to the fact that Taskmaster _and_ Fancy Dan had been arrested, and the Kingpin had been none too happy with them at all.

 

“Drink?” Frederick asked as they reached his house, a rather nice manor-style home tucked between two buildings in West Village. Montana gave him a nod, climbing out of the car, and the pair made their way up his small front yard to the door, which Frederick unlocked with two keys and a four-digit code on a number pad set into his door.

 

Being second-in-command to the biggest (in every way) crime boss in the city landed you a lot of enemies.

 

“Help yourself, I just stocked the fridge,” Frederick said, reaching for the lights. “Been doing a lot of – “

 

The lights didn’t come on. He flipped the switch a few times, glancing around.

 

_SLAM-thwip-thwip!_

 

He jumped, looking behind him as the door shut soundly, and webbing appeared across it, effectively barring it. He wheeled around, searching for the culprit, but as soon as he thought he saw anything, it was gone, leaving only his darkened entryway. Once, he thought he saw a pair of glowing blue eyes, but when his head whipped back, they were gone.

 

“Boss, what – agh!”

 

Frederick had his gun out, aiming it in the direction of Montana’s voice as his underling seemed to fly into the air, wrapped in a cocoon of webbing and now dangling upside-down, covered up to just under his nose. He stared wide-eyed at Frederick, shouting muffled obscenities onto his gag. Still, Frederick saw no one, spinning frantically around. He ran to his kitchen, trying the back door, but it was also webbed shut, and a quick check of the light switch told him that his house just had no power.

 

“Show yourself!” he yelled, spinning and jumping back with a yelp when suddenly, there was a pair of blowing pink eyes staring at him from alarmingly close.

 

“ _If you insist_ ,” a modulated female voice said, and his shirt was grabbed. He felt himself yanked with inhuman strength, and then he was airborne, landing on his kitchen island and scrambling to get up. Before he could, though, his arms were tied down with that weird webbing, another strand pinning his head to the counter around his forehead. His legs dangled over the edge of the island, feet just skimming the floor. He couldn’t do much more than feebly kick at the air, though, and the position was not agreeing at all with his back.

 

“ _Good evening, Mr. Foswell_ ,” another modulated voice said, this one male, and a gleaming metal blade loomed in his vision, reflecting his terrified expression. “ _I’m going to ask you a few questions. And you are going to answer me. If you don’t answer to my satisfaction, my companion here is going to cause you an immense amount of pain, and I am going to ask the question again. Lather, rinse, repeat, until we’re happy. Sound good?_ ”

 

“Y-yeah…yeah,” Frederick said, glancing around, but with his head pinned, he couldn’t get a look at either of them, just the occasional glimpse of a pink glow from the girl’s goggles as she paced around the kitchen.

 

“ _What was Wilson Fisk’s intention with attacking Oscorp_?” Spider-Man asked. Frederick recognized the modulated voice from some of the videos he’d seen around YouTube.

 

“He…he wanted to scare you guys,” Frederick said. “Maybe collect some info on who you are. He just wanted you off his back.”

 

“ _Why Oscorp_?”

 

“He…he knows they’re the ones that give you your tech,” Frederick said, gasping when Spider-Man’s face loomed directly over his, glowing eyepieces flickering.

 

“ _How did he find out_?” he asked.

 

“I-I don’t know,” Frederick blurted, and he heard a growl sound in Spider-Man’s throat, contorted by his modulator into a truly terrifying noise.

 

“ _Hit him_ ,” he said to the girl, who strode forward and curled a couple fingers over her palm.

 

“Hey, hey, I – gaaaaaah!” Frederick seized up, pain lancing through his entire being. It only lasted a couple of seconds, but they were agonizingly slow, painful ones. When she withdrew her hand, his whole body ached, and there was a metallic taste in his mouth. “Sammy Silke! Sammy Silke! He’s one of our informants.”

 

“ _And how did_ he _find out_?” Spider-Man asked.

 

“I-I don’t know, you have to ask him,” Frederick admitted, and Spider-Man stared at him for a long moment. “I swear, I got no idea! He tells me stuff, and he’s usually good for his word, so I don’t ask him too much!”

 

“ _He’s telling the truth_ ,” Spider-Man said, that blade once again passing over Frederick’s face, showing him how wide his eyes were, tears streaming down his cheeks. The blade whipped away fast enough that Frederick made an involuntary sound of fear, replaced by the pamphlet that had been making the mail rounds for a week or so. “ _’Wilson Fisk Annual Fundraiser for Homeless Youths’. Wow, Scarlet, I wonder how many of those poor children are homeless because their parents got gunned down in the streets or overdosed on the drugs he sells them or were just abandoned by the prostitutes he’s extorting every day_?”

 

“ _I’m gonna go out on a limb and guess all of them_ ,” the Scarlet Spider said.

 

“ _Is Fisk going to be there_?” Spider-Man ask Frederick.

 

“I-I…the guy’s a busy man, y’know, I – aaaaaaagh!” he broke off as Spider-Man slammed the blade of the knife inches from his head, slicing into his ear.

 

“ _I missed on purpose_ ,” he said flatly.

 

“Yes, he’s always at this one!” Frederick said, trying to keep still. Every movement only caused the knife to slice a bit deeper, the cool steel sliding along the cut. “Good PR, he gets to schmooze up to the mayor, he wouldn’t miss it for anything!”

 

“ _Security_?” Spider-Man asked.

 

“Fuck, you kidding?” Frederick asked. “He’s got every goon he can fit into that place watching his back, usually even has a couple supers, just in case.”

 

Spider-Man looked up in the direction Scarlet Spider was probably standing, giving a small nod.

 

“ _I’m ready, are you_?” he asked.

 

“ _I’ve never been more sure about anything in my life_ ,” Scarlet Spider said.

 

Spider-Man reached for the knife, yanking it free and sending another small lance of pain through Frederick’s ear. Another impact near Frederick’s wrist made him wince, and he stared up at Spider-Man, who was already looming out of his vision. The knife was close enough that he could shimmy his wrist along it and free his arm.

 

“ _You’ve got a knife, cut yourself free_ ,” he said, striding toward the kitchen door and kicking it off the hinges, turning back to deliver one final warning. “ _If I ever see you again, I will kill you_.”

 

……

 

“Piotr, you get to see me every weekend, can I please just have a little moment to myself?”

 

“Ah, Illyana, of course,” Piotr said with a bright smile. “I have just…missed you so very much.”

 

Illyana smiled up at her older brother (she’d caught up to him slightly in age, but he still far outpaced her in size) and wrapped him in a hug, Piotr ruffing her hair.

 

“I have missed you, too, of course,” she whispered, nuzzling his chest. “But between Stephen Strange and you, I have not had a moment to myself in weeks. I can be permitted a small walk around the grounds no?”

 

“Very well,” Piotr said in a mock-suffering voice, letting a theatrical sigh that made Illyana giggle for the first time she could remember. There hadn’t been much for her to giggle about in the past six years or so, but every day, her big brother was his usual teddy-bear self and made her feel more and more like her old self. “But no skipping dinner today. You need your strength, after all.”

 

“Yes, Big Brother,” Illyana sighed, waving to him and stepping out the front door of the X-Mansion. The place was fairly empty, lately, most of the students with their powers under reasonable control having gone home for the summer. For Piotr and Illyana, the X-Mansion _was_ home, though. Not that that was bad. The grounds were just as beautiful as she remembered, and quite a sight better than the endless, bleak expanses she’d spent her formative years wandering.

 

But she didn’t want to brood on that. She had come away from those days a stronger girl, and in the end, she’d found her way back. She even had a few new friends, or she hoped so. Peter Parker and his friends seemed nice, and she remembered Kitty from when she’d first arrived here so long ago. Now that the two were closer in age, they got along better than ever, and that was a blessing.

 

Friends didn’t just appear out of nowhere, after all.

 

_Ker-CRACK! PSHOOOOM!_

 

Quite suddenly, a bright orange pillar of light seemed to burst from the ground before her, a warm breeze whipping about the trees, sending birds and bugs scattering and kicking up a hell of a dust storm. Illyana only took a few steps back, hardly surprised by much of anything anymore, though she watched curiously. Seconds later, just as quickly as it appeared, the pillar vanished, retreating into the sky until it winked out of distance and leaving a deafening silence in its wake. Birds cawed indignantly at the sudden disruption, blades of grass fluttering around in a small tornado of greenery.

 

Illyana’s eyes took a moment to adjust to the change in lighting as the bright orange light gave way once more to the dim evening, but once she did, she noticed there was a girl standing in front of her, looking around before spotting Illyana. She gasped and hurried forward.

 

“Excuse me,” she said. “What year is this?”

 

“Um…what?” Illyana asked, shaking her head uncomprehendingly.

 

“The year!” the girl asked more urgently. She was probably Illyana’s age, maybe a bit older, with shoulder-length sandy blonde hair, piercingly blue eyes, and a somewhat familiar-looking face. “Please.”

 

“It’s…2017,” Illyana said. “June twenty-first, to be exact.”

 

“June twenty…” the girl trailed off, looking thoughtful. “Oh my gosh, what time is it!?”

 

“It’s seven o’clock or so…um, why – oof!” Illyana was yanked away by the girl.

 

“There’s still time!” she said. “We just need to bring along some friends!”

 

“Wait a minute!” Illyana said, pulling her to a halt and tugging her hand free. “Who _are_ you? What the hell’s going on?”

 

“I’m…I’m from the future,” the girl said. “My name is Mayday, and I’m here to stop the rise of a supervillain.”

 

……

 

“Are you talking about Peter?” Gwen asked, and Mary Jane nodded at her.

 

“He hasn’t been home in two days,” she said, nodding at Jess. “Or, if he has, it hasn’t been for long. Jess spends nearly every day here, waiting for him.”

 

“Gwen, I’m…I’m worried,” Jess said, standing and hurrying over to embrace Gwen in a hug. Nearby, Lana and Kitty were sharing Peter’s computer chair, Googling anything Spider-Man related, but nothing recent was turning up.

 

Julie had left hours ago to go look for the pair, accompanied by Miles and Ganke. Mary Jane was considering doing the same; anything was better than waiting around for him.

 

“He can take care of himself,” Gwen said, and Jess shook her head.

 

“I’m not worried about him, I’m…I’m worried about what he’ll do,” she said. “He almost killed that man. He’s…. Both of them, they’re not in a good place at all.”

 

“I know,” Gwen said, placing a hand to her forehead. “I know, but…maybe he just needs to sort things out.”

 

“No, you heard Cindy,” Mary Jane said, sighing. “He was…distraught. He doesn’t want to sort things out, because that just leaves him with…what happened. He’s mad, he’s…furious. All of this work he’s done, and it just got Aunt May….”

 

She trailed off, and the crushing grief settled back onto her with the knowledge of what had happened. She hadn’t known Aunt May for too long, but even in that short time, she’d come to regard the woman as sort of an aunt of her own. She’d been unfailingly kind, treating everyone that came through her house with a kind smile and a home-cooked meal. She was almost too good for this world, and now she was gone. She could scarcely imagine what Pete was feeling; this echo of his anguish was horrible enough. Gwen crawled onto the bed, wrapping her in a hug, and they were soon joined by Jess, Lana, and Kitty. Mary Jane snuggled into the five-way embrace.

 

“Anyone feel like we should be doing this for Pete?” Lana said from in the pile, and they all nodded. They stayed like that for a few minutes before they began attempting to extricate themselves. Just as Mary Jane was considering checking her phone for a text, chirp came from the computer, and the pile shifted as Kitty phased through them, climbing from the bed.

 

“Oof!” Gwen said, flopping onto the bed. “Kitty!”

 

“We’re getting a call from Tony Stark,” Kitty said, tapping the mouse. “Tony?”

 

“Who is this?” a voice came on, but it didn’t sound like Tony. That faint English accent sounded more like….

 

“Doctor Connors?” Gwen asked, crawling from the bed. “What’s going on?”  


“Gwen,” Connors said. “Is Peter there with you?”

 

“Um…no,” Gwen said. “We have no idea _where_ he is, or Riley.”

 

“I think I might know,” Connors said grimly. “Two intruders just broke into the sub-basement levels at Oscorp. I thought it was a couple of impostors, but it seems Peter and Riley have made off with the symbiotes.”

 

Mary Jane gasped, eyes going wide. No. No way Peter would be _that_ upset, willing to go _that_ far to get back at whoever did this. Was he insane!?

 

“Are they insane!?” Gwen shouted. “No, damn it…. Damn it! Where’s Tony?”

 

“He’s inbound,” Connors said. “He and Miss Danvers were out, but they’re going to suit up and find him. Gwen…we could really use help. We have reason to believe that symbiotes gain strength with each host they jump to, and Venom has done a lot of body-hopping in the time he’s been on Earth.”

 

“We’re on our way, Dr. Connors,” Gwen said. “See you soon.”

 

“Good luck,” Connors said, cutting the call off. Mary Jane was already suiting up when Gwen turned around.

 

“Let’s do this,” she said.

 

“So, Peter has that black thing from before?” Lana asked. “What could he possibly need it for?”

 

……

 

“Esteemed guests, financial contributors, partners, and friends,” Wilson Fisk said, grinning across the room at the assembled guests. “I welcome you all to the seventeenth Wilson Fisk Annual Fundraiser for Homeless Youth. Truly, children are the future, and…”

 

Blah, blah, blah. Wilson Fisk sure liked to listen to himself talk. Or, rather, Norah supposed he liked to know that other people were listening to him talk. She sighed and glanced around the party covertly. There was quite a spread laid out, and an open bar, which was nice, but it came at the cost of spending an evening in the company of a man so disgustingly corrupt that Norah could barely stand to look at him.

 

Jameson had probably thought he’d been doing her a favor when he offered her this gig. A chance to dress to the nines and spend the evening rubbing elbows with New York’s financial elite. Of course, J. Jonah Jameson was also a reactionary sycophantic slug who only cared about selling papers and smearing anything that didn’t fit into his narrow worldview.

 

Not that Norah was resentful or anything. No, the Winters family never had anything bad to say about the Jameson family, not as long as Norah’s father, the mayor, continued to endorse the newspaper as the finest news source in the city and in return they reported only the stories that reflected what a good job Samuel Winters was doing running the city.

 

Norah wasn’t terribly fond of her father, either. Sparing a quick glance at some kind of samurai statue next to her, she turned back to watch Fisk pander to his constituents.

 

“…want everyone to eat, drink, mingle, and most of all, give generously. We are the children’s only – “

 

_CRAAAAASH!_

 

Norah’s head snapped toward the sound of windows crashing, as did the whole parties, and a few gasps and screams sounded out.

 

“Oh, dear God, what _is_ that!?” a voice shouted as a hulking black creature smashed through the window and swept Fisk up in one of the four tendrils sprouting from its back. It was massive, big enough to send a silverback gorilla running in terror, and its face was dominated by a gaping mouth set with rows of jagged, razor-sharp teeth, eight glowing green eyes set in the space that was left. Along its back, white vertebrae sprouted out like jagged spines, rib bones curling over its sides. It opened its mouth and loosed a gut-wrenching roar, showing off a long, snaking tongue.

 

“ _Good evening_!” it yelled. “ _I truly hate to impose, but Mr. Fisk owes me a game of chess! I was just about to topple his king_!”

 

“ _Now, dearest brother, don’t hog all of the limelight_!” another voice shouted from behind the black figure, and a slimmer, more feminine form moved sinuously in behind him, stalking in circles. Like her “brother”, her face was all teeth, with eight blue eyes instead of her brother’s green. She prowled forward on all fours before standing erect, gazing around commandingly. The red tentacles sprouting from her back shifted and hardened into spider-legs, which she brandished at the guests. “ _Savor these moments, Fisk, as you watch your peons fall. They shall be your last!”_

 

“Shoot them!” Kingpin shouted, and the black monster chuckled while the red one cackled manically, lunging forward. Anyone that was toting a gun was not spared, as she took the bullets without even flinching. She scooped up one and tossed him out the window, grabbing at the next and hurling him into a wall hard enough to splinter it. Meanwhile, her brother charged forward like some horrifying combination of a bear and an elephant. Norah hurried to take cover behind a buffet table, for all the good that would do.

 

“ _Hahahaha!” the black one cackled as he simply barreled over a crowd of the gun-toting men, lifting one and sending him flying out the window as well. “AHAHAHAHAHAHA! How does it feel!? HOW DOES IT FEEL KNOWING HOW MEANINGLESS YOU ARE TO ME?! YOU’RE PAWNS, CANNON-FODDER!”_

 

He lifted two of them and slammed them together, hard, tossing them aside and backhanding another, swatting him away like a fly.

 

“Starr, put this thing down!” Fisk yelled, and Norah watched as what she’d thought was some kind of statue of a samurai sitting in a corner suddenly stirred to life, its eyes blinking red before glowing more brightly. It stepped off of the pedestal it had been on and drew its sword, lunging forward….

 

Only to be pounced on by the red one, who pinned its arms down before simply ripping them away, tossing the limbs aside and proceeding to tear away bits of armor plating, wires, servos, and other shiny bits, tossing them aside with animalistic ferocity. When the robot’s chest cavity was gutted, one of her spider legs speared it and tossed it away, the husk clattering in a corner. Another brave enforcer ran up and shot her point-black in the back with a shotgun, but this only caused her to stumble and wince, turning and screeching at him, her mouth opening unnaturally wide as she lifted onto her spider legs and grabbed him up.

 

“ _I should call you brave, but you really are just COMPLETELY FOOLISH_!” she shrieked, lifting him and slamming him into the ground. She rose back to her feet, skipping over to her brother, who was still holding the Kingpin aloft.

 

“ _Are you ready, Sister_?” he asked, and the female nodded. The tendril holding the Kingpin curled and whipped him toward the open window, but he landed short, rolling and staggering to his feet.

 

“This doesn’t have to end this way,” he said. “What is that you want? I promise, I will do what I hck-guck!”

 

“Oh my God…” Norah gasped, looking away, but the image of the Kingpin being impaled through the chest by a tendril from each of the two monsters would be burned into her brain forever.

 

“ _We want only one thing, Fisk_ ,” the black monster said, his voice now only a haunting growl.

 

“ _Die_ ,” the other said.

 

Norah heard a sickening crunch, then a distant impact followed by the screeching of tires and several car horns sounding. Standing, she dared to look around. The two beasts were gone, and the other party guests seemed intact; the only ones injured (or worse) were the enforcers.

 

Suddenly, two new figures flew into the place, these ones much smaller and more human-shaped. One was a male, wearing a black and red bodysuit of sorts that almost had Norah ducking behind the table again, but this one was obviously just a costume and not…whatever that thing was. The other was wearing a similar suit, though this one was mostly a dark blue with some purple and magenta tones.

 

Ricochet and Spider-Girl, Norah remembered. Jonah had a whole bulletin board dedicated to keeping track of “those mutated freaks”, as he called them.

 

“ _I think we missed them_ ,” Ricochet said with a glance around, and Spider-Girl made a frustrated little motion.

 

“ _Damn it_!” she cursed, looking around and spotting Norah. She hurried over, shrinking away from one of the bodies of the Kingpin’s enforcers, and paused in front of Norah. She was much shorter up close. “ _Did you see what happened? Which way did they go_?”

 

“I-I didn’t see the end,” Norah confessed. “They…I think they killed Wilson Fisk.”

 

“ _They definitely did_ ,” a third one said as he swung in through the window, this one in a yellow costume. He landed and hurried over to the other two,  and Norah recognized him as Phage. “ _I checked down below. He’s…definitely dead. I coulda gone my whole life without seeing that_.”

 

“Who was that?” Norah asked, always the vigilant reporter. “Or…what were they?”

 

“ _Lady, we know as much as you do_ ,” Ricochet said.

 

“But you must have theories about – “

 

“ _Let’s go_ ,” Spider-Girl said, sighing. “ _I know her. She’s with the_ Daily Bugle.”

 

“ _Ew_ ,” Phage said as they headed back toward the window. “ _She’ll find some way to blame this on us. Good luck publishing outright lies, lady_.”

 

With that, the trio dashed for the busted window and leapt away into the evening. Norah couldn’t even get indignant on the _Bugle_ ’s behalf.

 

All of what they’d said had been right.

 

……

 

“… _in with us, Wilson Fisk, one of New York’s most well-known and influential philanthropists, has apparently been murdered in the middle of his Annual Fundraiser for Homeless Youths_ ,” the television said as Sammy stepped out of his shower, wearing only a pair of sweats and toweling his hair dry.

 

“Ho, damn,” he muttered to himself, stepping around his couch and snagging up the remote, turning up the volume.

 

“ _Little is known about the details of the attack or the motivation behind the murder, but details are still coming in_ ,” the reporter said. “ _Early eyewitness testimonies describe two attackers, both having apparently undergone extensive genetic modification. Police sketch artists have compiled these two images. If you see anyone matching these depictions, police encourage you to call the tip line on the screen but do_ not _attempt to apprehend either of them, as they are considered –_ “

 

“ _They didn’t get my eyes right, Brother_ ,” a quiet hiss of a voice said behind Sammy, a voice that sounded like a snake sliding through the grass.

 

“ _There, there, Sister_ ,” a second voice said, this one a low shadow of a growl that seeped into his ears. “ _They will soon know who we truly are. We have only this business to handle_.”

 

Sammy wheeled around, reaching for the gun on his end table…but it wasn’t there. His eyes fell on his two visitors, and his heard leapt to his throat.

 

“Oh, fuck….”

 

“ _I hope it never stops being that satisfying_ ,” the brother said, lumbering forward. “ _The defiance, the shock, then the dawning realization that not only are you out of your league, you’re playing the wrong game…. Hello, Sammy Silke_.”

 

“Who are you?” Sammy asked, backing away, but he bumped into something very solid, turning around to see a gaping maw of too many teeth leering at him from under a set of eight glowing blue eyes. “I…hey, man I’ve never spoken to the Kingpin in my life.”

 

“ _No, but your buddy Frederick Foswell has_ ,” the sister said.

 

“ _And we hear you’ve been having him pass along a few messages_ ,” the brother snarled, his hot, rancid breath washing over Sammy’s face, that long, slimy tongue inches from him. “ _About Spider-Man. The Neighborhood Watch. Oscorp_.”

 

His heart sank from his throat, falling right past where it had been and dropping through his stomach. Could he run? Who was he kidding? He’d make it two steps before these things…ate him or something. Oh, God, he didn’t want to die.

 

“I didn’t…I mean….”

 

“ _We aren’t here to listen to your excuses_ ,” the brother said. “ _Who?_ ”

 

“Who…?” Sammy asked, grunting as a black tendril came up and wrapped around his neck, pulling him close enough that his chin was pressed against one of those teeth. He clasped at it, his heart hammering as he feebly tugged it away.

 

“C…C’mon, man,” he choked out. “I-I got a kid – “

 

“ _WE HAD A MOTHER_!” the brother bellowed at him with enough force to leave his ears ringing. “ _Who is your inside man? Who did you get the information from_?”

 

“Kingsley!” Sammy gasped, feeling the grip on his neck loosen. “Roderick Kingsley! He’s some kind of…finance guy at Oscorp! He’s one of the Kingpin’s moles.”

 

“ _Moles_?” the sister asked.

 

“He’s got them all over the city,” Sammy said frantically. “Businesses, country clubs, newspapers…hell, there’s a couple in the mayor’s office.”

 

“ _Roderick Kingsley_ ,” the brother growled out softly at his sister, his gaze turning back down to Sammy. “ _Where is he now_?”

 

“P-probably on his way home,” Sammy stuttered. “There’s this Greek place he always eats at on Friday nights. Ah!”

 

He yelped as he was suddenly jerked close to the brother’s face, staring into those sinister eyes, hearing a low, rumbling snarl. “ _Show us_.”

 

With that, he swooped out of Sammy’s apartment, dragging him along wrapped in one of his tendrils.

 

Sammy might have taken a moment to ponder how uncomfortable the trip to intercept Roderick Kingsley was…if he wasn’t so terrified that he was going to die at the end of all of this. This strange brother and sister pair was a total unknown to him. They didn’t seem to be entirely there, but they were intelligent enough to follow a trail and had enough foresight to bring Sammy along for the ride in case he double-crossed them.

 

Crazy was scary enough. Crazy and _intelligent_ was terrifying.

 

The pair seemed to care little for his comfort, and as New York city whipped below him, he bounced, spun, and trailed along behind the brother, alternately getting a breathtaking view of the city sprawled below and the gorgeous cloudless night sky. Given the circumstances, though, he couldn’t really appreciate the amazing summer evening. Every few minutes, they would stop and badger him for directions on how to get to Kingsley’s house.

 

All he could think about was Marie, who ran out on him months ago with their newborn son, little Davey. She always told him mob life would be the death of him. If he got out of this, he was going straight, no more gang dealings. The Kingpin was dead anyway, it would be a simple feat for any of his more reluctant underlings to take advantage of this opportunity to get out of Dodge.

 

That was, if he survived the night.

 

He could move to Wyoming. Nothing ever happened in Wyoming.

 

Too soon, he was pointing out the small SoHo townhouse that Roderick Kingsley called home, and the pair cackled.

 

“ _Sister, why don’t you go collect our special guest_?” the brother said, and the red one shrieked with laughter as she leapt across the street, soaring straight into the wall of Kingsley’s home and crashing through it. Sammy heard a distant shout, followed by two gunshots, and seconds later, a thrashing Roderick was sailing across the street back to the rooftop, carried by the sister.

 

“What the fuck’s going – Sammy!?” he yelled.

 

“ _You’ve been betrayed, Mr. Kingsley_!” the sister said joyously. “ _What’s that they say? Turnabout is fair play_!”

 

“What are you gonna do?” Kingsley asked, his voice shaking. “You got us, now what?”

 

“ _What_ are _we going to do, Brother_?” the red one asked. “ _Quick and dirty or…ostentatious_?”

 

“ _Oh, I believe the occasion calls for a bit of the ostentatious_ ,” the brother said, stalking back and forth on all fours, Sammy bobbing along behind him. “ _No more hiding, no more fighting crime from the shadows. This city needs a savior with a more…hands-on approach_.”

 

“ _And what better way to open than by sending a message_?” the sister said with manic glee. “ _Like…fireworks. Only, instead of kaboom, ours will go…._ ”

 

“ _Splat,_ ” the brother said with a grin at Sammy.

 

Oh, fuck.

 

……

 

“A supervillain?” Gwen asked in utter disbelief.

 

“Oh, fuck,” Lana said.

 

The whole Neighborhood Watch had assembled at the X-Mansion’s Blackbird hangar, plus Tony Stark, Carol Danvers, Norman Osborn, Illyana Rasputin, Jean Grey, Scott Summers, and even Susan Storm and Ben Grimm had stopped in to lend their strength. Professor X was off in South America with a small team of X-Men on…business or something.

 

“I…I know this is a lot to take in right now, but you have to trust me, okay?” the girl calling herself Mayday said, glancing around at them. “Um…this is gonna be a bit of a trip for you, but just relax.”

 

Suddenly, Gwen’s vision was obscured, scenes playing out before her like a slideshow. She gasped as she recognized the Venom symbiote, along with its red offspring, tearing through teams of gang members, ripping them to shreds, tackling common super-criminals like Shocker and Ringer and mutilating them, and most disturbingly of all, leading legions of people dressed in tactical gear bearing a white spider logo into battle against a legion of gang members. Scene after scene played out, showing Peter and Riley employing brutally effective methods that would make the Punisher proud. As time passed in the slideshow, their followers grew in numbers, the weaponry and armor they wore visibly improving, and one particular scene stood out, of Pete and Riley standing atop a wall, fighting off SHIELD agents and succeeding thanks to some rather sophisticated turrets. Peter’s ingenuity apparently survived his fall to supervillainy.

 

 _‘Today was determined to be the point of no return,’_ Mayday’s voice spoke in her mind. _‘After today, the symbiotes bonded to Peter Parker and Riley Benson, twisted their minds. They became…something different._ ”

 

More images, these of Peter and Riley, looking mostly normal, but Peter’s eyes were…poisonous green, and Riley’s were unnaturally blue. Their clothing was all black and all red, respectively. They seemed to be trailing long cloaks that flowed in the wind, but there was no apparent breeze, judging from their hair remaining perfectly still as they spoke to a room of assembled followers. Gwen couldn’t make out the words, but Pete seemed to be shouting, giving a rousing speech. In the next scene, Peter was smiling fondly at someone with their back to the viewpoint before his eyes caught whoever was watching him, grinning widely. One scene lingered longer than the rest. The pair were facing…Julie? Suddenly, a darker maroon mass peeled away from Riley’s cloak, advancing on Julie, who look terrified but determined.

 

_“Welcome to the family.”_

 

“No!” Julie’s voice screamed, and the visions cut off, Gwen getting a little dizzy from the sudden change of scenery back to the here and now. Julie was shaking her head, staring in shock at Mayday. “That…no way, that wouldn’t happen! I wouldn’t join them!”

 

“You…well, you did, but it was to get message to…to me,” Mayday said.

 

“To you?” Julie asked. “Who even are you? How can we believe you? Maybe you’re just some psychic here to fuck with our heads!”

 

“She…she’s telling the truth,” Jean said, glancing around before her eyes landed on Mayday again. “Jeez, how did _that_ happen?”

 

“I never really got a straight answer from them,” Mayday said with a distasteful frown.

 

“From who?” Harry asked, looking unusually serious. “Care to cut the non-telepaths in?”

 

“From her parents,” another voice said, and a girl stepped into their midst. She had shoulder-length platinum-blonde hair and icy blue eyes, and she was studying Mayday intently, looking confused but intrigued by her presence.

 

“Emma,” Jean said. “I don’t think – “

 

“Oh, this is absolutely my business,” Emma said with a wry little smile. “The girl is my daughter, after all.”

 

Mayday stared wide-eyed at Emma. “I…didn’t know you were here yet,” she said, sounding not at all pleased at the news.

 

“Have been for a few months,” Emma said, and the more Jean and Mayday seemed discomforted at her arrival, the happier she seemed to grow. The strange standoff was interrupted by a gruff voice.

 

“Okay, future-daughter, past-mom,” Harry said, striding toward the blackbird’s launchpad. “Let’s get moving, huh? The more people we have, the more we have a chance of beating some sense into Pete.”

 

“Agreed,” Johnny said, following closely behind. “Pete needs _us_ for once. Let’s hit it.”

 

“Listen to your uncles, sweetie,” Emma said, and Mayday glared at her.

 

“Uncles?” Gwen asked, following as they headed for the Blackbird. “What are we missing?”

 

“Mayday’s father,” Jean said, catching up to them. “Emma seems to find it rather hilarious.”

 

“Oh, it absolutely _is_ hilarious,” Emma said, smirking as she followed, having apparently invited herself along.

 

“Who is it?” Gwen asked.

 

“Peter Parker,” Mayday said with a glance over at Gwen. “I’m here to stop my dad from becoming a supervillain.”

 

……

 

“ _Alright, we’re gonna do this in teams_ ,” Carol said, her Iron Marvel armor’s eyes glowing yellow, as did her arc reactor, glimmering in the dim light of the Blackbird’s cabin. “ _If we all go down there at once, we’ll just be tripping over each other, and it’ll be good to have some fighters in reserve in case these two are stronger than we thought. Isolate the symbiotes, get to them to the containment units, and do it quickly_.”

 

“ _Jess, MJ, Gwen, Tony, and I want first crack at Pete_ ,” Harry said, and Carol turned to him. He stared right back, daring her to disagree, to stop him from dragging his friend’s ass away from that thing, but she just nodded.

 

“ _I’ll go with Ben, Flash, Bobby, and Norman to get Riley_ ,” she said before turning to Jean, Mayday, and Emma. “ _I want the three psychics out there, too. Try to reach them mentally, if you can. Scott and Johnny, you’ll cover them_.”

 

“I can do that,” Scott said, Johnny nodding next to him.

 

“ _We are overhead_ ,” Piotr’s voice came from the cockpit, and the hatch in the middle of the floor opened, showing the scene blow. A hulking black monstrosity and a slim red beast were prowling in circles around the rooftop of the Oscorp building, toting along two smaller figures. Harry felt a tight grip on his arm, and he looked to see Gwen trembling a bit.

 

“ _Harry…Peter needs us_ ,” she said, sounding on the verge of crying. “ _Now, more than ever, he needs us_.”

 

Harry nodded. “ _Well…let’s go kick his ass until he’s all better again_ ,” he said, and Gwen let a frantic little giggle. Together, with the others in tow, they leapt from the Blackbird, Harry unfolding his hoverboard under him. Rather than swing, Gwen latched onto the board, in front of him, and MJ clung onto his back. Jess fired up and flew alongside them, Tony on their other side. They closed in, and a faint yelling voice grew louder and louder in Harry’s ears.

 

“ _…have no place begging for mercy, you SCUM_!” the warped, twisted voice of Venom said, yelling as he dangled some guy over the edge of the building. “ _The lives you’ve ruined, ended, THROWN AWAY just to further your own causes! And youhaha…you want me to SPARE you because you’re a CHANGED MAN!? HAHAHAHAA! Sister, listen to him! Oh, all it took was his imminent DEATH for him to reform_!”

 

“ _How terribly convenient_!” the red offspring said. “ _Like a child yelling ‘time out’ in a game of tag just because he’s ‘it’ now! Too late for a rule-change_!”

 

“ _How about some new players_!” Harry shouted, and they glanced up. For a short moment, their faces warped, the toothy grins closing, sealing up, and their faces resembled their normal masks as they stared at their friends.

 

“What…what are you doing here?” Peter’s voice came, sounding wonderfully like himself.

 

“ _Stopping you from going down a dark, dark path_ ,” Gwen said. “ _Spi…Peter. Peter, please, come back_.”

 

“You don’t understand!” Peter yelled, his voice warping a bit. “I-I have to do this! We have to make a stand! These…monsters won’t be tolerated. Not anymore!”

 

“ _So you’re just gonna_ become _a monster, is that it_?” MJ asked. “ _King and Queen of the city_?”

 

“If that’s what it takes,” Riley said. “We have to send a message.”

 

“The only message you’re sending is that you’ve learned nothing,” Jess said, floating forward, her voice dangerously calm. “With great power, Peter….”

 

“That’s not – “

 

“With great power, Peter!” Jess repeated. “What’s the rest!?”

 

“Uncle Ben is _DEAD_!” Peter snarled, his face splitting back open into a snarling maw of teeth. “ _And when I pushed at them, they pushed back, and now Aunt May is – …No, we pushed, they pushed. Escalation is an ugly game, but it is a necessary means, sometimes_.”

 

“ _We’re not going to let you do this to yourself, Pete_ ,” Harry said, shaking his head. “ _You dragged my ass out of that thing, I think it’s only fair I do that same_.”

 

“ _Riley, remember what I told you_?” Julie asked, her voice soft and imploring, and Riley shrank away, snarling. “ _You are the most important thing to me. Ever. That…that_ thing _is not taking you from me_.”

 

As one, the pair tossed away their captives, who shouted as they flew away. Tony and Carol swooped away to get them.

 

“ _This seems like something you need to discuss amongst yourselves_ ,” Tony said. “ _We’ll be in the wings if you need us_.”

 

“ _We don’t wanna fight you, Pete_!” MJ shouted, and Peter snarled a leering grin at them.

 

“ _No…_ ” he said. “ _No, you don’t_!”

 

He leapt, faster than Harry could track, but Gwen was on it, leaping from the glider to intercept him and kicking him back toward the building. With a shattering crash, he flew through a window, and Gwen webbed into the hole he’d left. Harry swooped behind her, followed by Jess. On the other side, Peter and Gwen faced off in the middle of a rather ritzy-looking office that may even have been Dad’s.

 

Leaping from his hoverboard, Harry dashed forward and intercepted Peter’s attempt to take a swipe at Gwen, grabbing his arm and lifting him, swinging him into a wall, sending several paintings and plants falling from the wall and jerking a bookcase hard enough that a few fell to the floor. Harry felt himself lifted off his feet as Pete snarled at him, rearing his arm back, but MJ was already there.

 

_Thwip-thwip!_

 

Peter growled and strained against the webbing that had tied him down to the wall, a tendril sharpening and beginning to cut through it. He snarled and charged at Harry, but Jess was there, two balls of flame billowing at him, and he shrank away with an enraged snarl.

 

“ _Haha, looks like a fire drill_!” Peter yelled, jamming his hand into the wall and ripping it away with a metal pipe in his hands that began spewing water. He cupped his hand over it, the symbiote twisting to form a rudimentary hose. “ _I always wanted to be a fireman when I grew up_!”

 

Jess was showered with water, and she staggered back, her flames going oout and causing her to land bodily on the floor. Peter charged forward, and Harry growled as he reached back, hooking his collapsed hoverboard onto his wrist and spinning to deck Peter across the jaw with it, sending him flying into a wall hard enough for him to crash right through it and topple into the next room, which looked like some kind of conference area. Harry leapt through as Peter climbed to his feet with a chuckle.

 

“ _You don’t get it, do you_!” he yelled. “ _We are already one! Venom, Peter, we are neither of these! We are Poison! And we will…will…ngh_!”

 

“ _I’ve got them_ ,” Mayday said over their intercom. “ _I’m trying to talk to Peter and Riley. Is it working_?”

 

“ _I think you’ve got Peter_ ,” Harry said. “ _Julie how’s Riley_?”

 

……

 

“ _She looks a bit out of it_ ,” Julie said, tugging her mask away. “Riley. Can you hear me?”

 

“That…that’s not me,” Riley said, her face having shrunk back to the toothless mask of before. “No way, I…. _YOU’RE LYING! A WITCH PLANTING FALSE MEMORIES! SHOW YOURSELF_!”

 

The toothy maw sprung back to existence, and Riley tore for the edge of the roof, leaping to where Mayday was hovering, surrounded by a faint purple aura. At Riley’s approach, she dodged through the air, zipping to the rooftop and holding her hands up.

 

_Thop-thop!_

 

Riley found herself latched down to the rooftop by pristine white webbing, and Mayday held her hands out again.

 

_Thop-thop!_

 

Riley’s arms were webbed to her sides, and she struggled in vain against the webbing, her tendrils finally curling down and lashing away the binds. By this time, Norman had already closed in, holding out a massive metal hand.

 

_Kreeeng-WHOOM!_

 

The symbiote snarled in pain at the soundwaves, hundreds of small feelers uselessly scrabbling at the air.

 

“ _Brother_!” Riley shouted, and a rumble sounded from below before the ground under her burst open, Peter scooping her up, slicing the bindings away before they both landed. “ _Perhaps we should make our escape and regroup_.”

 

“ _Agreed_ ,” Peter said, snarling a grin at them. “ _It would be a shame for our plans to fall through on account of our supposed friends_.”

 

They turned and dashed for the edge of the roof, but before Julie even had a chance to think of a plan to stop them, they ran into a translucent purple-blue barrier.

 

“ _Going somewhere_?” Johnny asked, swooping overhead. “ _I’m sorry, we’re not done with our intervention yet_.”

 

“ _Agh, FOOLS_!” Peter snarled. “ _So be it. I shall in these confines with a monarch’s voice –_ “

 

“ _Cry havoc and LET SLIP THE HOUNDS OF WAR_!” Riley finished, tearing forward and leaping at Johnny, who swooped out of her reach, but she wrapped a tendril around his leg, landing with him in tow.

 

“ _Woah, woah, calm down_!” Johnny said, flapping feebly until Norman dashed in with a rumbling of footsteps, holding out both hands.

 

_Kreeeeeng-SHOOOOM!_

 

The symbiotes shrank away, Riley releasing Johnny. They shared a look, and as one, they ran at Norman, leaping and landing on his chest. Riley tore at the arc reactor on the left side, Peter at the one on the right.

 

“ _Don’t let them get the arc reactors_!” Norman said. “ _Tony, need your assistance_!”

 

“ _Do I smell a summer bonus_?” Tony asked, swooping overhead.

 

_Kreeng-WHOOM!_

 

The pair retreated, but both of Norman’s arms were now moving quite sluggishly, the lights on his palms dimmed considerably. Two sparking sockets were left where his twin shoulder arcs had been.

 

“ _They got my repulsors_ ,” Norman spat. “ _Damn it_!”

 

“ _Looks like we’ve stolen his thunder, sister_ ,” Peter said, chuckling and turning his gaze upward. “ _Two to go_.”

 

He leapt at Tony, once again colliding with a translucent barrier.

 

“ _Did you forget about me, Pete_?” Johnny asked, landing nearby. “ _And here I always thought you never forgot about me_.”

 

“ _Who are you_?” Peter asked, smirking a giant grin at him, reaching up and slamming his hands on the rooftop, two tendrils digging in and ripping away at the concrete, probably intending to dig an escape. He was just dropping a few inches when he stopped, thrashing now against a sphere-shaped barrier that Johnny had formed around him. Riley slammed at the other side in and attempt to free him before snarling and tearing for Johnny, but Ben Grimm was there, sending her cowering away with some flames.

 

“Johnny, trap her!”  he yelled. “You gotta try to do two at once!”

 

“ _Oh, is that all_!?” Johnny shouted back, holding out his other hand. As Riley tried to escape the flames, she found herself backed against the barrier, snarling and spitting at the fire, but the symbiote was retreating from her already, desperate to escape the fire.

 

“ _No!_ ” she screamed as crimson space-goo pooled around her feet, and she reached for it feebly. “ _I need it! I need it to save all of you! You_ can’t…do this!”

 

Her face faded back to normal as the symbiote curled away from the flames, attempting to slink away along the rooftop…toward Julie!

 

“Tony!” Julie shouted, and Tony landed in front of her.

 

“ _Got it_ ,” he said.

 

_Kreeng-WHOOM!_

 

The symbiote gave a spasm, now slinking away, but with a resounding _whump_ , a containment unit landed right on top of it, giving a pneumatic hiss. A few lights on it blinked red, then yellow, and finally green. Julie looked over to see Riley slumping to her knees, and she hurried over to catch her before she could fall to the rooftop.

 

“I’m sorry,” Riley sobbed, gripping tightly to Julie. “Oh, God, I’m…so sorry….”

 

“ _SISTER_!” Peter shouted, his efforts at escaping Johnny’s confines redoubling. “ _Release her! Release her at once_!”

 

“ _Uh, guys, I can’t hold him for much_ – “ Johnny broke off as Peter broke free, tearing across the rooftop for the containment unit.

 

“ _You will not stop me from—agh_!” Peter broke off as, very suddenly, there was a yellow-clad figure in front of him, holding her arms out as though for a hug, and Kitty Pryde grabbed Peter around the middle, seeming to sink into him.

 

“Peter Parker, you sit the hell…DOWN!” she shouted, and she landed on the rooftop with Peter, leaving the symbiote to collapse in on itself and dissolve into a mass of searching tendrils, but Tony was ready, a second containment unit landing on top of it. The lights blinked the same as they did on the other one, and just like that, with a blink of green, it was done. It was over.

 

“ _Symbiotes contained_ ,” Tony said. “ _We’re done here, people_.”

 

“Peter?” Kitty asked, Gwen hurrying over to kneel next to them, along with Harry. “Peter, are you okay?”

 

“I…” he sniffed, and Gwen leaned in to hug him along with Kitty, and even Harry joined in, followed by MJ and Jess. “I didn’t…. We just wanted to – “

 

“Ssshhh,” Gwen said, rubbing his back just as Julie was with Riley. “Everything’s…. We’ll figure this out, okay? We’re all here for you. Both of you.”

 

But he was asleep. Julie was already cradling a snoozing Riley, and it seemed Peter was slumped into Kitty’s lap, sleeping soundly. Julie imagined the pair hadn’t got much, if any sleep over the past couple of days.

 

“ _Let’s get them down to the clinic_ ,” Norman said. “ _Like Tony said. We’re done here_.”

 

……

 

“I thought we were done with symbiotes.”

 

Later that night, Norman was sitting in the small break area of the R&D floor, staring at his armor, which Tony was in the process of repairing and apparently installing some much-needed upgrades with the help of Carol. Tony himself was already on Mk. VII, while Norman was still on Mk. III.

 

This just couldn’t stand, it seemed.

 

Norman looked down toward the source of the voice, seeing Nick Fury standing at the edge of the shag rug that defined the “breakroom”, giving him his usual stern look. The overhead lights glinted off his bald head and reflected mutely in his leather jacket.

 

“Norman,” he said by way of greeting.

 

“Director Fury,” Norman replied flatly. “To be fair, Oscorp is the only facility equipped to house the symbiotes for the moment.”

 

“I’m aware of that,” Fury said, stepping forward, his hands clasped behind his back. “And I was willing to be fine with it, as well, since you seemed to have learned a valuable lesson about not prodding at things we don’t even understand on a fundamental level.”

 

“Parker and Benson had just lost a woman who was by rights a mother to them,” Norman said. “I think they can be forgiven a bit of an irrational outburst.”

 

“’Irrational outburst’?” Fury repeated. “No, no, an irrational outburst would have been a few smashed windows, punching a hole in the wall, hell maybe toss a TV out the window. An irrational outburst is reparable. This is a catastrophe. This is fifteen thugs in critical condition, five more dead, a crime boss street-pizza, and two men that are going to have to be held in SHIELD custody indefinitely because they heard you up there shouting Parker and Benson’s names.”

 

“We were trying to talk some sense into them,” Norman said.

 

“I don’t care if you were banishing a demon to the ninth plane of whatever!” Fury said. “Those kids left a skid mark on New York city, and – “

 

“Um…excuse me,” a voice said from the elevator, and Fury wheeled around to face Peter and Riley, who were at least looking well-rested, if still…quite morose as they made their way over. They were dressed in simple medical gowns, though they were at least wearing scrub pants to preserve their modesty. “Director Fury? I’m Peter Parker, this is – “

 

“Your clone?” Fury asked, and Peter bristled while Riley just huffed.

 

“My sister,” he said, stopping feet from Fury. “Jarvis told us you stopped by, and…not to be a narcissist, but with everything that happened last night, you’re probably not too happy with us.”

 

“That’s an understatement,” Fury said.

 

“We’re sorry,” Riley said. “We were…irresponsible.”

 

“Reckless.”

 

“Foolhardy.”

 

“Brash.”

 

“Inconsiderate.”

 

“Careless.”

 

“Yeah, yeah, I got a thesaurus, too,” Fury said, folding his arms. He sighed, looking them up and down, his hands moving to his hips. “Sometimes I forget you’re just a couple’a kids, though. And…well, I know the kinda grief you’re going through. I’m sorry to hear about your aunt.”

 

“Thanks for your sympathy,” they muttered in unison.

 

He studied them for a long moment, shaking his head.

 

“Ah, hell,” he muttered. “Under normal circumstances, I’d have you kids taken into SHIELD custody and stripped of your powers.”

 

The pair tensed, and Fury shook his head.

 

“You may not have been fully in control of yourselves with those things on you,” he said, “but you let them out. That’s on you. You knew what they were capable of, and you still tried to control them. _You_ are responsible for what happened last night. Do you understand?”

 

“Yes, sir,” they said in unison again.

 

“But…you helped me with the Hulk incident,” Fury said. “That could’ve ended in a lot of innocent lives lost, but it didn’t, and that’s the _only_ reason that my official report is going to say that you were simply under the influence of a symbiote. Now, make no mistake. This is _not_ me condoning what you did. This is me repaying a favor.”

 

“We understand,” they said, again in unison.

 

“I know you’re going through a rough time,” Nick said. “Like I said, I truly am sorry for your loss. But like you said yourselves, with great power, there must also come great responsibility. There’s red in your ledger now, kids. Both of you. You just gotta come to terms with that. But don’t you ever forget it.”

 

“Director Fury,” Norman said. “I think they’ve been through enough.”

 

“No, we get it,” Peter said, nodding.

 

“We’ll never forget,” Riley added.

 

Fury nodded, turning and heading for the elevator. He stopped as the doors opened, glancing back at him.

 

“I’ve got my eye on you kids,” he said. “I hear about any more incidents, we’re gonna have a decidedly less friendly talk.”

 

With that, he stepped into the elevator, the doors closing and carrying him out of sight.

 

“We deserved that,” Peter muttered, and Riley nodded.

 

“We deserved _worse_ ,” she said.

 

“Alright, you two,” Norman said, standing. “Back upstairs. You need your rest.”

 

……

 

The day after the Oscorp confrontation, we finally return home. It’s strange; the house looks exactly the same as when we usually get home at the end of the day or after school, but there’s something off. The curtains are drawn shut, the doors locked up tight, and Aunt May’s aging BMW is parked in the drive instead of the miniscule garage.

 

She never parks in the drive.

 

I mount the steps, Riley close behind me. After this whole thing, despite all of the bad (and there was a _lot_ of bad), I feel…closer to her. Gwen can sort of understand the grief, having spent a lot of her life around Aunt May as well, but Riley is the only other one who’s lived the same things I have, who’s lost two sets of parents.

 

I take out my house key, fitting it into the lock and opening the door. Inside, the house smells…stale. Someone’s been through to tidy up, but that was obviously days ago. Looking around the house, seeing it looking so…normal, I feel a swell of…something. Anger, regret, longing…and sadness…. Above all, a feeling so intense, so all-consuming, that there’s simply no word fancy enough, no SAT buzzword that will do it justice. It’s just…sadness.

 

I feel Riley pressing against me, and as one, we wrap our arms around each other, her fingers gripping tightly at my shirt.

 

“I don’t wanna be here anymore,” she whimpers, and I nod.

 

Suddenly, a sound fills the air, soft piano playing out a mournfully hopeful tune.

 

_“Hey, Jude…. Don’t make it bad…. Take a sad sooong, and make betterrr….”_

 

I blink, feeling warm wetness spill down my cheeks, and all at once, the strength seems to leave my body. I collapse to my knees, Riley pressing against me as Paul McCartney croons one of Aunt May’s favorites. If I try hard enough, I can hear her in the dining room, dusting off her antique teacups.

 

_“Rememberrr to let her into your hearrrt…. Then you can starrrt to make it betterrr….”_

 

I feel someone nestle into my other side, and there’s Gwen, smiling at me, eyes shining with unshed tears. She doesn’t say anything, just nestles into my side. Lana crawls into my lap, tucking herself under my chin, and Julie does the same next to me, curling into Riley’s arms. Harry even drapes himself against me from the back, wrapping Riley and I in a hug.

 

Soon, there’s just a dogpile, the entire Neighborhood Watch, my…my family, crowding into my living room, surrounding me. I chuckle a bit when I hear Flash singing along with the lyrics before Bobby bops him on the back of the head to get him to stop.

 

_“And anytime you feel the pain, hey, Jude, refrain…. Don’t carry the world upon your shoulderrrs….”_

 

“I’m…sorry, everyone,” I mutter.

 

“Sorry,” Riley echoes.

 

“Apology accepted,” Gwen whispers against me.

 

“But don’t you ever pull anything like that again,” Julie says with a frown, brandishing a stern finger at Riley, who just smiles and nods, wiping her eyes.

 

“Promise,” she says.

 

“Promise,” I agree.

 

_“For well you know that it’s a fooool who plaaays it cooool, by making his worrrld a little cooolderrr….”_

 

We sit there and listen to the Beatles, pretty much all day. There’s a proper wake to attend tomorrow, where we’ll all get dressed up and truly say goodbye to Aunt May before the funeral, but this, a pile of her loved ones surrounded by a pile of _their_ loved ones, listening to her music in the house that she and her beloved husband spent the better part of their lives in, this feels like a good sendoff. A good way to honor her memory. And…she’s with Uncle Ben. And my parents.

 

“We’ll take care of them, Aunt May,” I hear Gwen whisper. “All of us.”

 

 

 

 


	14. Chapter 14

I’m sure I have to be dreaming. I mean, everything has the dreamy feel to it where I’m just sure enough that I’m not awake that it’s only plausible that I’m sleeping. I’ve had these sorts of dreams before, and a bit of Googling has told me that I’ve slipped into lucid dreaming without even meaning to. I’ve always pondered looking more into it, but life is too busy to pick up _another_ hobby.

 

Being Spider-Man is one hell of a hobby, in the most literal sense sometimes.

 

Still, even beyond just lucid dreaming, this one feels different. Normally, once I realize I’m dreaming, it becomes harder and harder to stay sleeping, and I start slipping until the dream is nothing more than a daydream. This one…actually seems to solidify once I realize what’s happening. Not that I’m mad.

 

It’s nice to have one last breakfast with Aunt May and Uncle Ben.

 

“So, Pete, any big plans for the first day of summer?” Uncle Ben asks with a grin, serving himself up a heaping plateful of wheatcakes before reaching his knife toward the butter.

 

“Ben, leave some for Peter,” Aunt May says with a small slap on his wrist, and Uncle Ben snickers, shaking his head as he butters his breakfast.

 

“May, I’m just clearing off the little guys from the top,” he says, winking at me. “Pete loves the big fluffy ones at the bottom, don’t ya, Pete?”

 

“Yeah, Aunt May, Uncle Ben’s just looking out for me,” I say, grinning up at her, and Aunt May just chuckles, tousling my hair.

  
“Boys,” she says with a smile, turning and heading back for the griddle.

 

“You think Gwen’s gonna be coming over later?” Uncle Ben asks with a knowing smile, and I just roll my eyes as I serve myself some of the thicker wheatcakes from the bottom of the stack.

 

“Yes, but Harry might be, too,” I say loftily.

 

“I’m so glad you and Gwen are friends, Peter,” Aunt May says, taking a seat and smiling over at me as she stacks a couple of cakes onto her own plate. “She must get so lonely over there in that house, all by herself. It’s good that she has you to keep her company.”

 

“Well, I mean, she’s a good friend,” I say, _slightly_ annoyed at the look Aunt May and Uncle Ben share. Even back then, I _knew_ that they knew about my crush on Gwen, and of course, the parental goggles were in full effect. They could only see the good about me, so why wouldn’t any girl on Earth not be able to see it, too? Never mind that I’m a socially awkward nerd that could never hope to measure up to the fresh-faced jocks like Flash Thompson or Kenny Kong.

 

Back then, I found it so…unbearable. Their constant assurance that I was a “good catch”, that I was the kind of boy that would make any girl happy only served to make it that much more heartbreaking when I couldn’t seem to _get_ a girl. But…looking back, it was just their way of trying to instill some confidence in me. There are plenty of girls out there, Pete, surely one of them will realize how great you are, someday.

 

Wouldn’t they be surprised if they found out that not just one but five girls realized that I was worth the trouble?

 

Still…this much internal pondering, this much self-reflection in a dream means that this is no ordinary dream.

 

“Well, tell you what,” Aunt May says. “Your Uncle Ben and I are planning on a trip to the mall today, and I know you just get soooo booooored on these trips. So why don’t you stay home, and if Gwen feels like coming over, I trust that we can let you two alone for a few hours without any shenanigans? You’re twelve years old now, I trust you can be responsible, yes?”

 

Like Gwen would let me be anything else.

 

“Yes, Aunt May,” I say, and Aunt May pats me on the head.

 

“My good young man,” she says.

 

Her hand feels so real on my head. This really is no ordinary dream, but…is that so bad? Aunt May and Uncle Ben finish their breakfast and head from the dining room to get ready for their shopping trip, leaving me looking around the kitchen. It really does look just as it did so many years ago, down to even the details I shouldn’t be able to remember, like the little Post-It hanging on the fridge detailing a few items to add to the shopping list.

 

There are psychic shenanigans afoot, aren’t there?

 

“No one’s ever figured it out this fast,” a new voice says, and I glance around to see a girl with straw-colored hair making her way into the kitchen from the entryway. She eyes the color of melting ice and familiar features that remind me a bit of Riley, but that’s only because said features in fact belong to me, I guess.

 

“May,” I say, and she smiles, hunching her shoulders sheepishly.

 

“Hi,” she says with a small wave. “Um…I saw your dream. I’m sort of…under orders to make sure you don’t have any nightmares. Your…um, your girlfriends asked me to.”

 

Well, she probably would have figured that out anyway.

 

“I sort of did already,” she admits, and I sigh, rolling my eyes at her.

 

“ _That_ ’ll never get old,” I say wryly. She just giggles, strolling forward to stop in front of me.

 

“It’s okay, I won’t tell,” she assures me. “I’m used to keeping secrets. Being a psychic means hearing a lot of stuff that’s better off kept to myself. I can’t help it, but I can at least pretend it never happened.”

 

“That’s…actually probably the best way to approach the whole mind-reading thing,” I tell her, and she smiles happily.

 

“I learned from the best,” she says. “Or…well, okay, I heard everything that Mom did and did the exact opposite, but that counts, right?”

 

“Right,” I say flatly. “Your mom, my weird alternate future wife, Emma Frost.”

 

May just shakes her head. “At least you got me out of it,” she says with a little shrug. “And I came back and…well, stopped myself from ever existing. But I still do, so that’s fun.”

 

“How does that even work?” I ask. “You come back in time to stop me from ever turning evil, but you only exist because I went bad, so you don’t exist and can’t come back to stop me, so – “

 

“Daddy,” she interrupts me. “I…I mean, Peter…. Um…time-travel is…something that mankind won’t figure out for a long time. The mechanics of it are incredibly complicated, and if I tell you too much, it might…I mean, I could alter the progress of mankind in really terrible ways, so – “

 

“Say no more,” I tell her, holding a hand up in a placating gesture. “I mean, literally. Don’t say anything that’s gonna, like…collapse the space-time continuum or something.”

 

“I mean, if you’re worried about me, the…particular method I used is the most stable that we know of,” she says. “I sort of exist outside of the time-stream, or…something. Even I don’t understand all of it.”

 

“Well, you’re here, and you’re welcome to stay,” I say, looking around. “Well…as soon as I wake up.”

 

She giggles and steps into a hug with me. “Close your eyes,” she says. “That’ll make it easier.”

 

I do so, and moments later, the faint sounds of breakfast in the kitchen fade to the muffled noises of music playing in the distance. I can hear birds chirping, cars driving by, the distant clatter of a passing train drifting in through an open window.

 

And two distinct breathing patterns on either side of me.

 

I open my eyes, taking in the now-familiar sight of the ceiling of my room at the Osborn penthouse, which I’ll be calling home for the foreseeable future. Ever the diligent planner, Aunt May had a will, and other than some books she donated to the library and some Beatles memorabilia that went to a local museum, everything was left to me, including the house in Forest Hills. Unfortunately, I’m still a minor, so all of that belongs, for the time-being, to my new legal guardian, Norman Osborn.

 

That’s still taking some adjustment.

 

Norman’s a good guardian, though. He didn’t hesitate at all to offer Riley and I rooms in the penthouse, and Harry’s taking spiritedly to having a “little brother and sister”, as he now calls us.

 

It’s pretty alright. At least Jubilee is here to rein him in with he gets a bit too enthusiastic.

 

I sigh and glance to my left, finding MJ burrowed into the crook of my arm, and on my right, Jess is similarly situated, her eyes fluttering open the moment I move. She was probably awake and resting, waiting for me to wake up as well.

 

“Pete?” she asks softly, her eyes meeting mine as a small smile spreads on her face. “Hey, sleepy. Good dreams?”

 

She always asks that when she first sees me in the morning.

 

“With some help,” I say, and she looks confused for a second before letting a soft breath through her nose in amusement.

 

“Mayday is such a cutie,” she says. “She tries so hard to come off as like the confident psychic, but she’s just a total dork.”

 

“I just…can’t wrap my head around the whole Emma Frost thing,” I say. “She must have seen something in the weird combination of me and Venom.”

 

“I can see that,” Jess says. “I don’t talk to her much, be from what I hear, she’s…a total slut for the dark, brooding-but-powerful types. I can see her going for you with a dose of Venom. Did you get her friend request on Facebook yet?”

 

“Oh, God,” I mutter, and Jess giggles against me.

 

“I’d just accept the request and let her see that you’re actually a sweet, dorky nerd,” she says. “She’ll lose interest in a hurry.”

 

“I like that plan,” I say, flopping back to my pillow. I have no desire to get out of bed. The same black pit of listless energy-sapping blah that engulfed me when Uncle Ben died has opened up again, wider than ever since I’m now an orphan for the second time. I know there’s a world out there that’s still turning, people in my life that love me, and my burgeoning career as a superhero (despite nearly everyone in my life’s insistence that I shelve that while I grieve), but even with all of that, all I wanna do is just lie in bed until Aunt May and Uncle Ben come in to wake me up.

 

Damn it, Pete, this was gonna be a good morning.

 

“Pete?” Jess asks, looking up at me and wiping a tear from my cheek. I didn’t even know I’d started crying. “Hey, hey, I know…. I know.”

 

She climbs onto me and hugs me tightly, her warmth pressing against me. Jess’s body temperature has run a bit hotter than average ever since her mutant power showed up, and despite the somewhat uncomfortably warm nights when she shares a bed with me, it has the added bonus of making her extra huggable.

 

“Oh, are we awake?” MJ’s voice comes from my other side as she stirs and rolls onto her back, peering over at me. “What’s wrong?”

 

“Just a bit of a rough morning,” Jess says, and MJ gives me a wan little smile, kissing me on the cheek and snuggling into me.

 

“We all miss her, too, Pete,” she says. “We’re here for you.”

 

“Now you’re just gonna make me cry more,” I say with a huff of laughter, and MJ kisses my ear.

 

“Crying’s healthy,” she says. “Endorphins and stuff, right?”

 

“It’s always endorphins,” I say, and Jess giggles softly, climbing off of me and cupping my face. She smiles down at me, her expression full of such tender, warm affection that despite my “rough morning”, I can’t help but feel a bit better.

 

“Just never forget, you’re not alone,” she says. “We’re all here for you, Pete. We love you. Heck, Harry’s out there making you like four omelets for breakfast.”

 

I snort, shaking my head. “He makes some awesome omelets,” I admit, and Jess nods, crawling from under the covers and standing to stretch, revealing that her shirt has ridden up considerably in the night, giving me quite a fantastic view.

 

“Jess, your butt’s showing,” MJ says, reaching out over me and tugging Jess’s shirt down with a small laugh.

 

“Oh, gosh, my ladylike modesty is compromised,” Jess says with a theatrical hand to her heart, turning to smirk down at me. “Now I shall never be wed.”

 

“Oh, Peter will marry you, I’m sure,” MJ says, and I chuckle.

 

“Yeah, what’s your group’s plan for marriage?” I ask. “I marry one of you, and the rest of you marry each other?”

 

“That’s actually not a bad plan,” Jess admits after a short pause. “Dibs on Gwen if I don’t get Peter.”

 

“Damn it!” MJ huffs. “Gwen’s got such a cute little butt, it’s like…heart-shaped.”

 

“It is nice,” I agree, glancing toward the door when I hear a soft clearing of a throat, and we all see Gwen peering into the room with a smirk on her face.

 

“If you’re all done discussing my butt,” she says, “omelets in five.”

 

“I think we need about five more minutes for proper butt discussion,” MJ says, and Gwen snorts, rolling her eyes.

 

“Not sure if I should be flattered or creeped out,” she says.

 

“The correct answer is yes,” Jess tells her. Gwen shakes her head, skipping quickly into the room to plant a soft kiss on my lips.

 

“Good dreams?” she asks.

 

“Good dreams,” I agree, and she smiles, dropping one more kiss on my forehead before heading back for the kitchen, giving her butt one extra wiggle as she leaves.

 

“Visual aid,” she sings while she heads from the room, and Jess and MJ cheer as she shuts the door behind her.

 

Girls are weird sometimes.

 

……

 

“Harry, sometimes I think I’ve figured you out, and then I realize I’ve just been mentally filtering out all of the weird,” Jujube said, and Harry grinned at her.

 

“Babe, that’s the nicest thing anyone could ever say about me,” he said. “My adorable quirks are so common to you, you don’t even notice them anymore.”

 

“Yeah, we’ll go with that,” Jujube said with a snort, giggling and planting a kiss on his cheek. “But, really…just because I like omelets, that doesn’t mean you have to like…maximize your omelet skill or something.”

 

“I know,” Harry said with a smirk down at her, “but I want to. Besides, omelets are delicious, and you can customize the fuck out of them. I’m making Pete a pizza omelet right now. How many breakfast foods can you make out of pizza stuff?”

 

Indeed, he was currently supervising the slow cooking of a mozzarella and pepperoni omelet, with subtle hints of Italian seasoning. It was a bit unorthodox for an omelet, but Pete would appreciate the gesture, he was sure.

 

Anyway, with their spider-sized appetites, there were times when they ate too fast to even linger on the taste.

 

“So, what’s the agenda for today?” Jujube asked with a reluctant smile that told Harry she was just trying to cope with how very strange Pete and Harry could get sometimes. Gwen gave the same smile to Pete on more than one occasion, and it made Harry grateful that he could have the sort of friendship that just befuddled their respective girlfriends.

 

“We’re gonna head to Flushing Meadows, go for a little walk,” Gwen said nearby, stirring a giant pan of hashed browns while a pot of sausage gravy stewed on a backburner. “Just enjoy the sights and have some downtime, take a little break.”

 

“Peter Parker, taking a break?” Jujube said with a small snort, and Gwen rolled her eyes.

 

“We’re _making_ him take a break,” she says. “We have some of our best Neighborhood Watch members keeping the city safe in his absence.”

 

……

 

“Do you think the Human Torch like…farts while he’s lit up and gets these like fire-farts?” Ganke asked. “Like, squaring off in the middle of battle, he pops off a toot and like… _whoosh_?”

 

“Is this really what you spend your time thinking about?” Miles drawled back.

 

“I’m pondering the intricacies of superhero life,” Ganke told him. “What happens when Flash takes a shower? Can Bobby get a brain freeze at all? If Jess sneezes while in Firestar form, does she spit magma-loogies?”

 

“You need a hobby, man,” Miles said with a shake of his head.

 

“I _have_ one,” Ganke said, gesturing out at the city. “Keeping this shit in order.”

 

“Well, you ain’t doing it enough if you got time to think about fire-farts and brain freezes and magma-loogies,” Miles said, shaking his head. “Or Flash in the shower. Leave that to Bobby.”

 

“Dude, those two are totally gay for each other,” Ganke insisted. “How do they not realize it?”

 

“I’m not sure you know this, but like four people have said the same thing about you and I,” Miles pointed out, and Ganke blinked before snorting.

 

“I would so wear the pants in that relationship,” he said. Miles just shook his head.

 

“In your dreams, pal,” he said, standing and pulling his mask on. “ _Anyway, you ready to get back out there_?”

 

“Hold up,” Ganke replied, holding a hand out as he pulled his own mask on. “ _Got spider-sense going nuts_.”

 

“ _I don’t feel any—oh, there it is_ ,” Miles said, looking around to find the source of the buzzing in his head. “ _How come yours is more sensitive_?”

 

“ _Because I can’t leap tall buildings in a single bound_ ,” Ganke retorted. “ _I gotta have something_.”

 

They scanned the surrounding buildings, but they saw nothing, and as soon as the spider-sense had flared up, it was gone.

 

“ _Huh_ ,” Ganke said. “ _That was_ – “

 

“Friends of the progenitor!” a voice shouted, causing them to jump. They turned and saw someone that looked like he was going for their general Spider-Friends look. He wore a mostly dark blue costume with a black-on-red web design across most of the chest and a white spider logo. His mask was the same black-on-red web design with large white lenses. “Ricochet…and Phage…. I do like that name, Phage. Very sinister.”

 

“ _Well…thank you_ ,” Ganke said. “ _Who are you_?”

 

“ _Wait, you’re the guy, the…clone_ ,” Miles said. “ _Spidercide_?”

 

“You remembered my new name!” he shouted jubilantly, causing them both to startle a bit as he raised his arms triumphantly at his sides. “I like you!”

 

He sounded just like Peter, Miles thought, albeit a Peter that had had maybe a bit too much coffee. Or ecstasy. What did he want with them?

 

“ _What are you here for_?” Ganke asked, on top of things as usual.

 

“I am so glad you asked,” Spidercide said, stalking left and right in front of them. “There is…something afoot. A catastrophe, a calamity, something bound to cause insanity. He waits and plans and plots and schemes, vows to dash our maker’s dreams.”

 

Right, the poetry thing. Peter had mentioned that.

 

“ _Who_?” Miles asked, and Spidercide cackled.

 

“That, friends, is the question of the hour,” he said. “Who? Who is he, who is me, who are we? Who knows but cannot say, who says but will not do, who does but will not think?”

 

“ _Not a fan of straight answers, is he_?” Ganke asked, and Miles shook his head.

 

“ _Pete mentioned something like…he might have a psychic block on him_ ,” he said, and Spidercide spread his arms triumphantly.

 

“Ah, to be understood!” he said with relish. “There are walls built, filters added, censorship at the very core of creativity. Well-meaning walls, means to an end, an end to the means.”

 

“ _Who built the walls_?” Miles asked. “ _Kaine_?”

 

At this, he groaned and pointed at Miles, gesticulating even as he gripped his head with the other hand.

 

“He has redoubled his efforts to silence me, but he is…b-becoming that which he fights,” he grunted out. “He fights fire with fire, burns down the arsonist’s house but only fans the flames. He doesn’t…care about the fire, only who starts it.”

 

“ _Fire_?” Ganke asked, shaking his head. “ _He’s gonna start a fire_?”

 

“ _I think he’s being metaphorical_ ,” Miles said, earning another frantic nod from Spidercide as the clone hunched over like he was in pain. “ _Kaine wants to do something big, something to…to stop someone else? But what he does to stop whatever’s gonna happen is just as bad as what’s gonna happen_?”

 

“Gaaah, find Kaine!” Spidercide shouted. “Help him see sense! He must be…thwarted. Monsters beget monsters, the sins of the father twisted, perverted by the sons. Good intentions, lofty dreams, nothing here is as it seems. The puppet thinks he pulls the strings, flying on his waxy wings, dawn is coming warm and bright, a fallen puppeteer to fight.”

 

“ _Wait_!” Miles said as Spidercide tore for the side of the building, leaping away. Ganke grabbed his shoulder as he made to follow, pulling him to a stop.

 

“ _I don’t think we’re getting any more out of him_ ,” he said with a shake of his head. Miles only sighed.

 

“ _Man, that guy isn’t just short some screws, he’s missing some nuts and bolts, too_ ,” he said.

 

“ _What did he say about a puppeteer_?” Ganke asked, and Miles shrugged, shaking his head.

 

“ _I dunno_ ,” he said. Ganke looked out at the city, glowing in the noonday sun. Somewhere out there, someone was planning something awful for this amazing place.

 

“ _Should we tell Pete_?” he asked.

 

“ _No, he’s on vacation_ ,” Miles said, folding his arms. “ _He’s got enough going on in his life without this_.”

 

“ _So, what do we do_?” Ganke asked. “ _Handle it ourselves_?”

 

“ _This is what we signed up for_ ,” Miles said. “ _The city needs saving in a huge way. And I think I know where we can go to find out what we need_.”

 

……

 

“This place is called Flushing Meadows,” Harry said, charging angrily in the direction of the bathrooms. “There should be like…restrooms everywhere.”

 

“I honestly just pictured fields of toilets when I heard the name,” Cindy said with a blithe little shrug.

 

“The hills are alive with the smell of Scrubbing Bubbles?” MJ suggested, and Gwen couldn’t help a small laugh. She turned to see Peter smiling a bit, giving his hand a squeeze. He glanced over at her, and Gwen leaned in, kissing his cheek.

 

“Pete, your hair is getting so long,” she said, brushing a lock behind his ear. He shrugged sheepishly.

 

“Should I cut it?” he asked, and Kitty quickly stepped up, hugging him from behind.

 

“Um, no way,” she said. “It’s sexy. Like Daryl Dixon.”

 

“Don’t git bit,” Peter advised her, and Kitty just laughed, shaking her head and glancing around before stealing a quick kiss.

 

“Dude, we would be so set in a zombie apocalypse, though,” Lana said from nearby. “Like…two different kinds of explosions, superhuman spider stuff, fire, which zombies hate, and if we ever find like batteries or something, Flash can just unload and recharge them.”

 

“Don’t forget Bobby for the frozen foods,” Peter pointed out. “Spam and canned ravioli and green beans would get old after a while. But oven-baked tater tots?”

 

“Dude, go find your own tots,” Cindy told him flatly, and Peter gave her a small mile.

 

“Maybe I will, gosh!” he said, snickering a bit and taking out his camera, aiming it at Cindy. She just stuck her tongue out as the camera gave a solid _click_.

 

“Pete, look, there are geese!” Jess said, taking his hand and smiling at Gwen, who obligingly released her grip on him. Pete let himself be led away, leaving Cindy shaking her head in amusement before Gwen grabbed her in a hug.

 

“Oh!” Cindy gasped, chuckling and hugging Gwen back. It wasn’t fair that she was a full head taller than Gwen, who seemed to have compensated for her lithe figure by not even gaining an inch in height, relegated to the “light and speedy” role. “I mean, I’m a hugger, but why are we hugging?”

 

“I think that’s the first time I’ve seen Pete actually smile in days,” Gwen said, and Cindy blinked, her expression turning a bit melancholy.

 

“Well…that’s great, but also…I hate that that’s how it is right now,” she said, shaking her head and watching as Pete took a few picture of Jess and MJ framed against the water in the background. “He’s been through so much, it’s not fair.”

 

“It’s not,” Gwen agreed with a sigh. “I mean…he’s lost two sets of parents, now. His whole life is…kinda fucked up right now, and still all he wants to do is…help people.”

 

“He’s a little amazing,” Cindy admits with a small laugh. “The Amazing Spider-Man.”

 

“Sounds like a franchise to me,” Harry said, reappearing with Jubilee in tow after his potty break. “Yo, we should totally write up some comic books. Do we know anyone that can draw?”

 

“I think Ganke might be good at drawing,” Cindy said. “He did the concept art for our costumes.”

 

“Yeah, what’s he even up to?” Gwen asked.

 

……

 

“We’re really calling this guy?” Ganke asked, and Miles nodded resolutely, pulling out one of the burn phones that the Watch kept around if they needed to make a sensitive call. He glanced at the card in his hand, dialing the number on it.

 

_Ring…._

_Ring…._

_Ring…._

_Ring…._

_Ri-Click. “Hello, Edpool speaking_ ,” the voice on the other end said. “ _Who am I speaking to_?”

 

“Um, hey,” Miles said. “My name is…well, I’m Ricochet. I’m a friend of Spider-Man – “

 

“ _Senpai_!?” Edpool squealed loud enough that Miles had to hold the phone at arm’s length. “ _Is he there!? Can he here me!? Hi, Senpai_!”

 

“Uh, he’s not around,” Miles said, carefully placing the phone back to his ear. “Sorry.”

 

“ _Awww_ ,” Edpool whined. “ _Well, I_ always _have time for Senpai’s friends. Wait, he likes you and respects your opinions on things, right_?”

 

“Uh, generally, yeah,” Miles said.

 

“ _I_ always _have time for Senpai’s friends_.”

 

“So, listen, we got a tip that this guy Kaine is gonna do something big,” Miles said. “Like…huge, big enough to mess up all of New York City, and we know you were after him, so – “

 

“ _Ooooh, bad Kaine_ ,” Edpool said, a sinister note to his voice. “ _Always taking other people’s toys and playing mix-and-match. Like that kid from Toy Story_.”

 

“Uh, yeah,” Mile said. Peter had warned them that Edpool was a bit…eccentric. That had apparently been an understatement. “So…do you know anything about where he might be?”

 

“ _Oh, you wanna partner up_?” Edpool asked. “ _I like that. My last appearance was setup to establish what I am, and now I’m finally getting a moment to shine! Well, I only know that he set up shop in some old apartment complex in the Bronx, but that was a little while ago. I’ve been a tiny bit busy with some other friends, but I’d be happy to help you out._ ”

 

“Um, sure,” Miles said. “Maybe you can text us the address, and we’ll meet you there?”

 

“ _Oh, I think I can_ ,” Edpool said, his voice now filled with relish. “ _Hm, because let’s see. Phone call to me. Boring trip to an old villain lair, and I’m going to be late under ambiguous circumstances. I think I’m about to get the point of view again_!”

 

“Right…” Mile said. “Well, you just text us the address, and we’ll be there.”

 

……

 

“Oh, I can do that,” I say. Hello, by the way. Hang on _just_ a second. “Edpool out.”

 

I hang up, because that’s what people do in action movies. Why say goodbye or close the conversation at all when you can just hang up all dynamic and cool-like? I send a quick text of Kaine’s little hideout to Ricochet (nice name, very ear-catching) before I look up and see a SHIELD agent peering into my cell.

 

That’s right, I’m in SHIELD custody! They’re not happy with me _at all_!

 

I guess chasing down a potential domestic terrorist is okay when _they’re_ doing it, but not when a concerned citizen is taking it upon himself to preserve a bit of the American dream.

 

With rocket-launchers.

 

And mortar.

 

And maybe a _little_ bit of napalm.

 

But come on, at least it wasn’t in a school zone! I thought of the children!

 

“Brock!” the guard shouts at me. “Where did you get that phone!”

 

“Well…I’d tell you, but that’s just embarrassing,” I tell him, placing my hands to my cheeks in a blush.

 

I mean, the words “prison pocket” carry such meaning with them these days. I prefer to think of it as “God’s little hiding place”.

 

The SHIELD agent enters the cell, his rifle aimed at me, and I just roll my eyes but hold my hands up. C’mon, man, you should know about the concept of plot armor by now. I only haven’t escaped because I was just _written_ here, so that means I’m in SHIELD custody for a reason.

 

Oh, yeah, the author has plans for me. Probably. Maybe he’s gonna kill me off?

 

I bet you’d love that, Dennis!

 

Is anyone named Dennis reading right now? Did you freak out, maybe just a little?

 

Alright, so the SHIELD guy, who’s probably named Paul or something, takes the phone, and oh yeah, Paul, you wanted the phone, you get it _and_ all of the fun that was involved in keeping it in my hiding place.

 

Maybe SHIELD will step up their cavity searches from now on.

 

I sure hope so.

 

Anyway, he leaves with a grimace, and I sit patiently, because I’m not gonna ruin whatever the story has in store for me. Oh, I hope it’s a spider bite!

 

Those are a dime a dozen in this universe.

 

Then I can be just like senpai!

 

A crash sounds from far above me.

 

“Oh, yes,” I say.

 

There’s a rumble, like thunder, or an earthquake.

 

“C’mon, baby,” I say. “Help Edpool out.”

 

The lights flicker once before a loud clanging sounds all around me, and then everything is dark except for the soft orange glow of emergency lighting.

 

“Yes!”

 

Chaos springs up, which is always fun, but my door isn’t opening! Curses. It’s probably hooked up to the backup generator! I sure wish someone would run by who was sympathetic to my plight! I hurry over to my cell’s window, peering out as SHIELD folks go running by, grabbing weapons, hurrying along with purpose, and generally panicking about something. One runs right by my cell, pursued by some kind of…drippy black thing. Wait…wait, I know that drippy black thing! My actual comic-book self had it for the longest time.

 

That’s Venom!

 

As I press my face to the window, the slimy symbiote grabs the fleeing SHIELD agent in a tendril, rattling out a growl at him. He’s looking for something, but he’s not finding it, because seconds later, the agent is thrown into my cell’s window hard enough to break it.

 

Ouch.

 

At least I’m free! I hop through the window, but I only make it a few steps before I hear another rumbling growl behind me. I stop and turn slowly around to see Venom leering at me.

 

“Oh, are we looking for a new host?” I ask, grinning. “Well, _something_ interesting needs to happen during my point-of-view, so come at me.”

 

The symbiote lunges, and I just take it, letting it smother me, wrap around me, coat me in its cold, tingly embrace.

 

Yeah, that’s turning _one_ of you on, isn’t it?

 

**Turning on? Who? Who are you talking to?**

 

Hm, who is this?

 

**I am Venom. You’re…speaking to someone?**

 

Oh, so _that’s_ how we’re solving the second voice in my head? Oh, this is _so_ much better than Madcap! And I’m not just saying that because I kinda can’t really say anything without the author writing it. Hello, Venom, I’m talking to the readers! Now, let’s get out of this place, and then we can have a nice, long, hard, intimate talk about life and where we fit in it, yeah?

 

**The readers?**

 

Yep! Say hello to them while I find an elevator!

 

**Oh…hello…readers?**

 

Never mind. I just punched someone, and wow, you make me really strong, Venom! The SHIELD agent I just punched flies backward, landing and skidding for seriously a few yards before tumbling against the wall. He was blocking the elevator, but I manage to prod it into working, since it’s probably a fire escape or something. No one wants to run up twenty flights of stairs in the event of a fire, so they probably left the elevators in service and fireproofed them or something.

 

I’m sure that makes sense. I mean, this is a story based on comics, and since when have comics needed more than a few words that make maybe a little sense to hold a whole story arc together?

 

I mean, at one point, someone just yelled “CLONES” and Spiderman got years of story out of just that one word.

 

After five haunting minutes of a lovely instrumental version of Careless Whisper (WHAM!), I find myself on the ground floor of the SHIELD building. Captain America (who is apparently an alternate/mainstream version of me, while I’m just a long-forgotten bad guy played by Topher Grace, LAME) is probably fighting the Winter Solider or some other Hydra incursion, leaving me to slip away with my new symbiotic partner.

 

**Partner? Mainstream? Who are you even talking to?**

 

Why, to the reader, of course! It’s maybe a little weird, I guess. Normally they can just look at my panels and read my charming yellow text-boxes, but now it’s all words because the author can’t really draw that well.

 

And that’s okay! Not everyone can draw!

 

Anyway, say hello to the reader one more time.

 

**Um…hello.**

 

Okay, now let’s get out of here. That elevator dropped us in a parking garage or something, and wow, there are some pretty nice cars in SHIELD possession.

 

“Brock! Hands above your head!”

 

**He’s aiming a gun at us! Kill him!**

 

Woah, woah, we don’t just kill any old guard for aiming a gun at us! We injure and humiliate them! I hurry at the guard, and he unloads a few rounds, but my new bestie and I are both pretty okay with getting shot a few hundred times.

 

**Don’t call me your bestie.**

 

Whatever. Show me what you can do, Venom. I bet you’ve picked up a lot of tricks from the other folks you’ve hung around with. A tentacle snaps out and wraps around the SHIELD agent’s neck, whipping him behind me and flinging him into a wall.

 

Ouch, nicely done.

 

**I still think we should kill him.**

 

You’re so adorable and psychotic! I love it! But no, we only kill bad guys, or Senpai might get mad at us!

 

**Senpai…. Spider-Man? Peter Parker….**

 

 _That’s_ his name? How do _you_ know that?

 

**He was my most recent Carrier.**

 

Senpai was _inside_ you!?

 

Teehee.

 

**You are unaccountably strange.**

 

I appreciate that. So, the SHIELD agent has a lot of ouchies, and we need to get out of here. I bet you got some web-swinging stuff from Senpai, right?

 

**Why do you call him that?**

 

Because I’m nothing more than a parody of myself? I jump off the side of the building, holding a hand out.

 

_Splup!_

 

Really? Splup? That’s the sound we’re going with? That’s the sound my webs make?

 

I love it.

 

I splup my way across the city, and you’ve read enough of Spider-Man’s little web-swinging interludes (his name is Peter; so cute!) to know what happens with the dynamic shots and the impossibly contorted positions comic artists draw him in, sometimes with a certain Miss Watson clinging to his back.

 

Meow.

 

Kaine’s latest hideout is an old abandoned apartment complex in the Bronx, which he’s been using for some kind of nefarious plot. From what I’ve gathered, it’s not his actual evil lair, which is probably secreted away somewhere underground.

 

Or in a volcano. But there aren’t any of those in New York, sadly. Not yet, anyway. Some supervillain’s gonna make that part of his evil plan someday, I bet.

 

**That’s actually really impractical.**

 

Um, have you _seen_ some of the plans these villains come up with? I wouldn’t be surprised if there was already a canon instance of a volcano-based hostage situation.

 

Remind me to check the wiki when we get home.

 

**I miss the bear.**

 

Anyway, here we are, and my two investigative sidekicks should already be waiting for me….

 

**Miles and Ganke. They are…Peter Parker’s friends.**

 

You and I are gonna have to have a serious talk later about all of the neat stuff you know.

 

**I can mutate us into a giant man-spider.**

 

Let’s keep that one on the shelf for now, but interesting. Alright, there are our new friends, Miles and Ganke. But they don’t know that I know who they are, and I’m sure I don’t want them to realize I have an alien symbiote that I think may have caused them some grief a few times.

 

**A misunderstanding, really.**

 

Right. But let me do the talking anyway, hm?

 

“Fellas!” I say, making my way over to the pair. We’re on the roof of the apartment building, which is windy, but it only makes things seem more dramatic, I think. “Good, you found the place.”

 

“ _This is Kaine’s hideout_?” Miles asks, and I shake my head.

 

“No, this is an outpost kinda thing,” I tell him. “Kaine’s got a big project in mind, but I don’t know what it is. But he’s got a little bit of everything to put behind it.”

 

“ _What’s that mean_?” Ganke asks.

 

“He has cloning tanks, Weapon X research and samples, that raptor serum, and whatever the hell made Stegron,” I say. “Remember him?”

 

“ _Kinda_ ,” Miles says.

 

“ _We weren’t part of the whole thing until after Stegron_ ,” Ganke admits.

 

I might have to go back and read that part sometime.

 

**We can do that?**

 

Yeah, hush. I’m trying to seem normal.

 

**That’s impossible.**

 

Why do you suddenly have a sassy personality?

 

“Well, anyway, Kaine was doing something here, but I got sidetracked before I could come check it out,” I say.

 

**SHIELD arrested you. Why don’t you tell them that?**

 

Because I don’t want it to get back to Senpai, now shush!

 

“ _So, he probably already cleared out_ ,” Ganke says, and I nod.

 

“But he might have left something behind we can use to track him,” I say, heading for the rooftop access door and kicking it down.

 

**That might not even have been locked.**

 

Yeah, let’s waste precious seconds wiggling a doorknob when we can look badass and kick a door down! You have so much to learn. Okay, so my two stalwart companions follow my lead down the stairs into the abandoned building. Lots of the walls are crumbling, and graffiti tags cover the place. The remnants of some kind of homeless shantytown still linger, but Kaine probably cleared them all out for whatever he was doing.

 

**Jerk.**

 

That’s what _I’m_ saying!

 

We head downstairs and find that this floor has had most of the walls ripped out except for a few supports and retaining walls, leaving a mostly-open area about twenty by twenty yards.

 

“Bingo,” I say, glancing around. “Okay, gang, let’s split up and search for clues.”

 

“ _Ruh-roh_ ,” Ganke mutters.

 

I like this kid.

 

They veer off, and I glance around the place. It’s a cluttered mess, of course, making it difficult to spot anything out of order when there’s no order in the first place. Reminds me a bit of my apartment, actually. You would _think_ Al would pitch in and clean up a bit, but noooo, all she does is complain about how she can’t _see_ anything to clean it up.

 

Such a whiner.

 

Still, I know enough about homeless life to know what they tend to accumulate, and that’s never anything of value. The valuable stuff gets sold for a quick buck. Old ratty clothes, trashed mattresses, moth-eaten blankets, those are par for the course.

 

A spiffy-looking metal device straight out of a spy movie, though….

 

“Over here,” I call, heading for an old but sturdy-looking wooden table with aforementioned shiny metal device on it.

 

Aforementioned. That’s a big one for me. Venom, are you boosting my vocabulary?

 

**I’ve been hosted by a few geniuses.**

 

And a bear.

 

**I still miss the bear.**

 

Anyway, what is this thing?

 

**It looks like a timed-release chamber for dry materials and an aerosol dispersal unit.**

 

“It’s a timed-release chamber for dry materials and an aerosol dispersal unit,” I say.

 

**Tell them I knew it!**

 

They don’t even know you’re here, shut up!

 

**You shut up!**

 

“No, _you_ shut up!”

 

“ _Woah, you still with us_?” Miles asks.

 

“Yep,” I say. “So, I’m betting whatever Kaine’s working on, it involves a chemical reaction that produces some kind of mist or something, and he’s planning to release it.”

 

“ _Chemical warfare_ ,” Ganke says. “ _Could be anything. A toxin, a disease…zombie virus_.”

 

“Someone call Rick Grimes,” I say. “Or Will Smith. He’s great at stopping apocalypses.”

 

“ _Guys_ ,” Miles says, tapping me on the elbow.

 

**He touched me.**

 

For real, shut up for half a second.

 

Miles gestures around, and I get a good look at the floor, which I just notice is sporting quite a few ring shapes embedded in the faux-wood flooring and linoleum patches that mark where the kitchens once stood.

 

“ _Look how many of them he made_ ,” Miles goes on.

 

“Let’s check the bottom floor,” I say. “Might be more.”

 

We head for the stairs and move further down, emerging into a hallway like any other apartment, though like the rest of the building, it’s old and derelict, sporting more graffiti tags and general wear and tear.

 

Venom, you are doing wonders for my vocabulary.

 

**I had the last narrator as my host for a little while.**

 

Storytelling powers, much?

 

So, we search the rooms, you know how these detective scenes go, and I find traces of a glittering blue dust of some kind. Drugs? Or a chemical mixture meant to be mixed with water and dispersed as an aerosol agent of germ warfare?

 

I’m onto you, Kaine.

 

“Look at this,” I say to my companions, and Ganke leans in to examine it.

 

“ _We could take some of this back to…um, headquarters_ ,” he says. Nice. Headquarters. Sounds so official, like SHIELD Jr.

 

Wasn’t that a show? Probably an animated movie. Marvel loves those, even if they’re usually just not good at them.

 

“ _Yeah, we can maybe find out what they are, at least_ ,” Miles says, reaching into his backpack and pulling out a plastic baggie. He slides some of the dust into it and zips it shut before looking up at me. “ _Thanks for your help, Edpool. You’re a little weird, but you’re alright. We’ll keep you posted on whatever the hell this stuff is_.”

 

Aw, he’s so nice! Why do so many people dislike Miles Morales?

 

“You have my number,” I say, springing a crisp salute. “Don’t be shy.”

 

I collect my own little sample of the weird blue crystals. I know a guy who can take a look at them.

 

He’s offscreen, you’ll probably never meet him.

 

Anyway, I think we’re done here, so why don’t we jump on over to…Peter? No he’s still at Flushing Meadows. How about Tadashi?

 

……

 

“This is amazing,” Tadashi said, staring up at the computer screen that showed a meticulously mapped scan of the human brain. They had done it. They’d really done it. Every nook and cranny, every neuron and synapse, synced up to a function. Actually building it was the next step, but they had a blueprint to work with and map the way. “Jean, this is amazing. You’ve sped up our projected completion date by…years.”

 

“Aw, you’re making me blush—oh!” Jean giggled a bit as she was wrapped in a hug by Tadashi, nestling into his arms and squeezing him with a soft sigh. “Glad to help.”

 

“You were more than just helpful,” Tadashi insisted. “You…I mean, this project wouldn’t have gotten done without you, Jean.”

 

“Well, we still have to make the actual brain thing, too,” Jean said. “Right?”

 

“Yeah, I guess we do,” Tadashi said, pulling away from the hug and giving her a little shrug. “But…well, that’s all technical stuff. You’re totally welcome to stay and help, but it’s a lot more boring working with machines and no real reading minds or anything.”

 

“Tadashi, I promise, I will never be bored doing anything with you,” Jean insisted, smiling warmly up at him, and more than anything, in that moment, Tadashi wanted to kiss her. More and more, it was getting harder to find a reason not to just be with Jean. The past months spent in her company were some of the happiest he could ever remember feeling. Jean blushed up at him, and Tadashi gave her a rueful smile.

 

“Stop reading your mind,” Jean teased him with a grin just as he opened his mouth. “I’m sorry, it’s just…such a nice mind.”

 

“Yeah, you’ve told me about how warm and fuzzy my thoughts are,” Tadashi said wryly. Jean stared up at him, eyes wide with amusement. She reached up and ran her hands over his shoulders, down his arms, and laced her fingers through his. Neither of them spoke for a long moment, Tadashi trying not to think about how the age gap no longer seemed to be quite as big a deal as it had seemed when they’d first met. Jean was brilliant, hilarious, and more than anything, one of the warmest, kindest girls he’d ever known. Her smile only grew wider, her eyelids drooping like a cat being scratched behind the ears; she was still reading his mind, the little scamp.

 

“Tadashi,” she whispered, and their lips brushed against each other’s, Jean sighing into the kiss. Tadashi brought his hands up, one gently cupping her face, the other resting on her shoulder, and Jean just wrapped her arms around his back, gripping handfuls of his labcoat.

 

_Bzzzzzzzzt! Bzzzzzzzzt! Bzzzzzzzzt!_

 

Jean groaned as she pulled away, reaching into her pocket for her buzzing cellphone and withdrawing it. She stared at the screen for a moment before sighing and swiping to answer, placing it to her ear.

 

“Hey, Mom, can I call you—huh?” she blinked, looking puzzled for a moment. “I’m…at Oscorp, why? Mom, of course it’s safe here. I’m surrounded by millions of dollars of military-grade—what? …Where? …What!? How!?”

 

“Jarvis,” Tadashi said quietly. “Recent news search: X-Men.”

 

“ _Searching_ ,” Jarvis said, and holographic screens came up showing numerous news stations, the anchors on the screen with the words ‘Attack on Mutants?’ and ‘Explosions at X-Manor’ imposed around them.

 

“Oh my God,” Jean said softly. “Oh my God, Tadashi. We have to get there!”

 

……

 

The chopper touches down, and I make sure my mask is in place. It’s the first time I’ve put the costume on in weeks, but the flickering lights of the HUD, the sound of my voice through the modulator, the hushed communication over our audio frequency, all of it is actually comforting, familiar. When I’m Spider-Man, I don’t have to be Peter Parker, because Peter Parker is…having a rough time of things right now.

 

I step out of the helicopter and note that I’m not the only one having some difficulties, apparently.

 

The X-Manor has been leveled. Smoke and dust blow in the hot, dry summer wind, carrying the smell of burning wood and soot. The yard is torn up, mounds of soil tossed aside with deep pits gouged into the grass, and there are even a few uprooted trees littering the lawn. Dotted amongst the wreckage, large purple humanoid robots lie in pieces, some still sparking feebly.

 

“Sentinels,” Kitty breathes, hurrying forward, followed by Bobby, Flash, Jess, and Jean. The rest of the Neighborhood Watch follows, with Tony and a contingent of Avengers close behind.

 

“ _Avengers, fan out and search for survivors_ ,” Colonel Rhodes, the Iron Patriot, says as he gestures around. “ _Tony, you and I can do an aerial search, Norman help with any heavy lifting that needs done_.”

 

“ _Understood, Colonel_ ,” Norman said, his large green suit (a fancy new one recently designed by Tony) nodding before lumbering toward the wreckage.

 

“ _Neighborhood Watch, same deal_ ,” I say, glancing around at my associates, who I’m pleased to see all just nod and wait for direction. “ _Johnny, Jess, Flash, Bobby, hit the skies. The rest of us, group up and watch out for any straggling bad guys_.”

 

The foursome takes to the air as well, and Gwen and Harry fall in with me as I head out into the wreckage.

 

 _“This is awful_ ,” Gwen says as we search for anyone that might need assistance. “ _Who would do this_?”

 

“ _Aren’t there like bad mutants out there_?” Harry asks. “ _The Brotherhood or something_?”

 

“ _Yeah, but they don’t hate the X-Men, per se_ ,” I say. “ _They both just want mutants to be happy, the Brotherhood is just a bit more extreme about how they operate. They would never attack the X-Men, especially unprovoked. I’m guessing just some anti-mutant guys got their hands on Sentinel technology_.”

 

“ _Yeah, what exactly are Sentinels_?” Harry asks.

 

“ _Huge robots whose sole purpose is to kill mutants_ ,” I tell him. “ _They were designed by this guy Bolivar Trask to exterminate mutants. He was very anti-mutant_.”

 

“ _Coulda fooled me_ ,” Harry said dryly. “ _So, could he have done this_?”

 

“ _Doubtful_ ,” I say. “ _He did a one-eighty after the X-Men saved him from the first line of Sentinels when they started to rampage and wreck his factory_.”

 

“ _More likely, someone took the designs and built their own Sentinels_ ,” Gwen said. “ _Someone who wanted the X-Men out of his way_.”

 

“ _That’s a lot of suspects_ ,” Harry observes, and we both nod before Harry comes to a stop, pointing frantically toward the remains of a wall, where a figure is impaled on a piece of rebar that protrudes from his chest, hanging yards off of the ground with his limbs dangling limply.

 

“ _Oh, God…_ ” Gwen says, her voice sounding faint. “ _Oh, no…._ ”

 

I shake my head, unable to say anything. The crumpled, broken form keeps morphing, shifting into a different body, one with gray hair and pale lips that will never curl into that motherly smile ever again. Glassy eyes that stare unseeingly ahead, the life behind the extinguished so senselessly. For a split-second, it’s Aunt May hanging off the wall, and I hurry over.

 

“ _Peter, wait_!” Gwen calls, hurrying to catch up as I climb up the wall to see a somewhat familiar face that isn’t Aunt May’s. No…she’s…. Get it together, Pete. Aunt May is gone. We just had the funeral a week ago. Everyone showed up. Felicia Hardy dropped by the cemetery one night with flowers. As I draw closer, I realize that this is a man known as Logan Howlett, the Wolverine, and thus it should come as no surprise when his eyes snap open, and my Spider-Sense clangs louder than ever, urging me to jump away.

 

It’s still a bit of a surprise, of course.

 

_Snikt!_

 

“Nyargh!” he slashes at the air where I was just hanging, teeth bared as his lips curl in a very inhuman-sounding growl.

 

“ _Wolverine, it’s okay_!” Gwen shouts, hopping onto the wall and climbing up nearby but out of his reach. “ _We’re friends! We’re with the Neighborhood Watch. I’m Black Widow, this is Spider-Man and Tar—uh, Silv—I mean, the Wasp_.”

 

Harry, stop changing names.

 

Wolverine’s eyes still look wildly around, and I figure our masks might be a bit off-putting. He’s an Avenger and is probably already privy to who we really are, so I pull my mask away. When he sees another human face, he calms imperceptibly, though my spider-sense is still buzzing faintly. Gwen and Harry remove their masks, and he lets one last growl.

 

“You’re…you’re Kitty’s friends,” he says, sounding a bit dazed. “She never shuts up about you.”

 

He looks down at the rebar he’s currently hanging from, grunting a bit.

 

“Help me out here?”

 

I hop back onto the wall and crawl up next to him, gripping him by the shoulders.

 

“Don’t be a bitch out it,” he says. “Like a Band-Aid, just one nyagh!”

 

I yank him free, and he spins in the air before landing on his feet, taking a moment to let the wound close up.

 

“Well, I’m gonna have nightmares, anyone else?” Gwen says, and I drop to a landing next to the recovering X-Man.

 

“Warning would have just made it worse,” I say, and Wolverine just holds up a hand, standing and sneering over at me.

 

Am I actually taller than him? A little.

 

“Thanks,” he says, glaring around, his face falling when he sees the ruined manor. “Aw, hell. They got the whole place.”

 

“Please tell me you evacuated or got to shelter in time,” Gwen pleads, and Wolverine nods with an uncharacteristically not-pissed look at her.

 

“Yeah,” he says. “Hank’s computer thing picked them up a mile out. We got everyone to safety, but once they got here, well…we fought the best we could.”

 

“What’ll you do now?” I ask, and he sighs, shrugging.

 

“I dunno,” he says. “Rebuild, probably. Send as many X-Men as we can home. Not many of them have homes to go to, though.”

 

“I can talk to my dad,” Harry said, stepping forward. “He can probably house a few of them. Nice thing to do and good PR.”

 

“Everyone wins,” Wolverine says with a smirk. “Thanks, kid. I’ll run that by the professor.”

 

“Logan!” a voice squeaks, and we all turn Kitty comes running over, leaping at Wolverine. He catches her and sets her down, awkwardly patting her back as Kitty hugs her. “You’re alive.”

 

“’Course I am, Kit,” Wolverine says, extricating himself from her grasp. “Been through worse. Helluva a lot worse.”

 

“This is a mess,” Piotr Rasputin says, sighing as he rounds a corner and makes his way over to us. He’s in his metal form, ridges of whatever alloy he’s made of creaking with wear, and from the look of it, he got caught in the blast as well. Scars and gouges line his dull, gleaming skin. “We are only lucky no one perished. I’m only glad that – “

 

_Crackle-CRUNCH!_

 

The sound of rippling earth breaks the still silence, an orange circle opening up in the ground next to Piotr. A glowing orange light beams out before Illyana steps forth, clutching a massive glowing sword that would make Cloud Strife jealous.

 

“Piotr!” she squeaks, jamming her sword into the ground before hurrying forward and hugging her brother, who wraps an arm around her, patting her head.

 

“I am unhurt, my dear,” he says. “I hope you didn’t worry too much.”

 

“I always worry about you, Brother!” she huffs. “I was training with Stephen, but we saw the news when we…got back to this plane. I jumped over here as soon as I could.”

 

“I am lucky to have a sister who cares for me so,” Piotr says, and Illyana just huffs again, stepping back and looking around.

 

“Was anyone hurt?” she asks, her eyes landing on me and widening a bit. “Peter! Your mask!”

 

“Yeah, circumstances kinda forced me to take it off,” I say, gesturing at Wolverine, who just grumbles.

 

“Wasn’t the mask,” he mutters. “Just a reflex action after a couple-hundred years of bullshit.”

 

Illyana makes her way over and smiles at me while Piotr and Wolverine talk.

 

“How are you?” she asks. “I haven’t seen you since…well, the funeral.”

 

“Doing alright,” I say, shrugging. “I mean, I have a bunch of friends that just refuse to let me be sad alone.”

 

“Good,” Illyana says with a small smile. “Being alone…gets quite old after a while. Um…if you ever need anything from the Sanctum Sanctorum, all you must do is call me. I believe I gave you my number?”

 

I nod, and Illyana smiles, stepping closer and kissing me on the cheek. Her lips are…warm. Very warm, and leave a tingling behind that lingers for a few seconds while she makes her way over to her brother. There’s a rushing sound overhead, and Tony and Colonel Rhodes land, surveying the two X-Men.

 

“ _So…just so we know, this wasn’t an early Fourth of July fireworks attempt_?” Tony asks. “ _Because, if so, I want an invite_.”

 

“ _Tony, I don’t think now is the best time for this_ ,” Rhodes says. “ _Logan. Nice to see you again. Piotr_.”

 

“Rhodes,” Logan said with a respectful nod. “Everyone’s safe; we got them below before things went down. They’ll need a place to stay, though. A lot of them don’t have anywhere to go back to.”

 

“ _Don’t worry_ ,” Rhodes said. “ _SHIELD won’t let you guys go this alone. But you have to accept our help, too. The X-Men have been sort of…standoffish in the past_.”

 

“Well, that’s because ‘help’ means a lot of different things to SHIELD,” Logan said before Piotr fixed him with a stern glare. “Yeah, yeah, alright. You can run it by Xavier, but I don’t think he has any room to refuse.”

 

……

 

“I refuse,” Jess said, and Gwen just scoffed while Kitty rolled her eyes.

 

Truthfully, Kitty was with Jess; she hated the idea of –

 

“Emma Frost,” Jess said, sitting near Gwen, who was perched cross-legged in the middle of Peter’s bed at the Osborn penthouse. The rest of the girls were gathered in his room in what Lana had sardonically termed a meeting of the “Brides of Parker”.  Peter himself was not present, off tinkering in a rare moment of alone time.

 

Apparently, he needed those once in a while.

 

“Emma Frost,” Jess went on, “who let’s not forget got together with Pete – “

 

“In an alternate evil future, Jess, c’mon,” Gwen cut her off. “She needs our help. She has nowhere else to go.”

 

“I mean, Pete’s staying at the penthouse, right?” Lana asked, shrugging. “So, why would it be so bad for this chick to stay at his place?”

 

“Lana, you haven’t known Emma for too long,” Kitty said, holding her hands up defensively when Gwen glared at her. “Gwen, just listen, okay? Emma is…manipulative, alright? She’s manipulative and has psychic powers, and I think the only thing that kept her from going full psychic-slave thing was the fact that Xavier was around.”

 

“Okay, but Mayday will be there, right?” MJ asked, shrugging. “If she starts to get out of hand, I bet she’ll keep her in line.”

 

“See, that’s what I’m saying,” Gwen said. “Just because she turned out…kinda not-so-good in a bad future doesn’t mean she can’t change. If Pete can turn out evil but be changed good, why can’t this girl?”

 

“This girl didn’t have an evil alien symbiote fucking with her head,” Jess muttered, and Gwen scooted closer, hugging her tightly.

 

“Alright, how about this?” Gwen asked, pulling away to smile at Jess. “Jean Grey turns eighteen in like…four days. We have her be the chaperone, and between her and Mayday, they should totally be able to keep Emma from getting out of hand.”

 

Jess huffed and glanced over at Kitty, who shrugged.

 

“I guess we should give her a chance,” she admitted begrudgingly. “Like you said, Pete’s gonna be here at the penthouse anyway. With Lana and I.”

 

Kitty glanced over at Lana, who grinned right back.

 

“Definitely a step up from that musty old foster place,” she said. Lana had only been an X-Man for a short time, but it was long enough for her to be officially released into the custody of the school, which meant that when the school was trashed, Lana got to go with the other X-Men and find a temporary home. Norman Osborn had kindly offered out several options for the X-Men in an unprecedented show of compassion from human to mutant. For personal friends of his son and legal guardians, he’d offered a bit of preferential treatment, opening up his penthouse and maxing out the occupancy, and for other Neighborhood Watch members whose families were less understanding about their children’s mutant abilities, the Parker house in Forest Hills was a fine option as well.

 

That was where Bobby (whose parents had disowned him the moment his mutant powers had surfaced), Flash (who still loved his family but didn’t want to endanger them with his budding lightning powers), and Emma Frost (who was loathe to reveal much of anything about her past, not that anyone pushed too hard to ask) would be staying with Mayday, who assured them that as far as the state of New York was concerned, she now had every right to live there.

 

No one pressed _her_ much about the details either, especially Kitty, who had known Jean long enough to know that psychics were scary sometimes.

 

“So, Emma’s going to be staying with her alternate-future daughter in her alternate-future husband’s house,” Jess sighed. “Why is she even part of this group?”

 

“Because May vouched for her,” Gwen said. “Look, I’m not super stoked about this either, but we can’t judge this girl on something she hasn’t done yet. And maybe she’s done some…not-nice stuff in the past, but people can change, and not just for the worst.”

 

“Now you just sound like Pete,” MJ said with a smirk, and Gwen shrugged.

 

“Well, I grew up with him,” she said. “I got to be front and center for a lot of his dorky little speeches.”

 

“I’m worried about him,” Kitty admitted, moving over to crawl onto the bed as well and sit at the foot. “He’s…too quiet.”

 

“He was like this when Uncle Ben died, too,” Gwen said with a little sigh. “All we can do is be there for him. He has a lot to sort through and a lot to come to terms with, and the best we can do is show him that he’s still loved.”

 

“I mean, he has five girlfriends,” Lana said. “That’s pretty damn loved.”

 

Gwen giggled and nodded. “Tell him that sometime,” she said. “Pete…I mean, he’s gone through a lot of loss, more than most people should ever have to deal with at our age. You can’t just dust off your hands and move past that, you know?”

 

“What’s he doing right now?” MJ asked.

 

“He’s poking away at his lab equipment,” Gwen said. “He kinda begged for some time alone, but I told him he has to come find us the moment he feels actually lonely.”

 

“I hate this,” Lana grumbled, sighing. “I don’t know how to deal with this…feelings shit. I just wanna push the ‘all better’ button or something.”

 

“You know, it’s enough to want him to feel better,” Jess said, smiling over at her. “It’s okay to not know what to do. Just be there. Pete loves you, and he’ll appreciate it.”

 

“You can sneak in tomorrow morning and wake him up, how’s that sound?” Gwen asked, and Lana shrugged, her cheeks tinging slightly pink.

 

“I think I can do that,” she said as Kitty raised her hand. Gwen rolled her eyes as she always did when Kitty treated these little discussions like some kind of demented schoolroom class, which the felt like sometimes.

 

“Yes, Katherine?” she asked, and Kitty puffed out her cheeks in annoyance. She _hated_ being called Katherine. The only thing worse was “Kat”, which she had once smacked Bobby for calling her.

 

“How long is the whole ‘sneak’ thing gonna be a thing?” she asked. “I mean…I’m kinda ready to go public with this thing.”

 

“Yeah, I kinda agree,” Jess said with a shrug. “Why should we be ashamed of this? We live in a progressive world, right?”

 

“We live in a world where progressive thought is encouraged on the internet and shit on by vocal conservatives,” Gwen corrected her, blinking at their rather shocked looks. “Sorry. Dad’s words, not mine.”

 

“Your dad’s completely awesome, then,” Lana said, and Gwen snickered.

 

“I’ll be sure to tell him that,” she said. “Look, I’m all for taking this public, but we need Pete’s go-ahead, and…he’s got a lot to deal with already. Maybe when he’s coped with what happened, okay?”

 

“Yeah, I guess I didn’t really think of that,” Kitty said. No doubt Peter wouldn’t want to deal with the stress of Aunt May’s death _and_ the accusing glares of the other guys of the Watch when they realized that he had stolen the hearts of not just Gwen but four other girls.

 

Was it their fault he was just such a…stupid-adorable hero? And…well, okay, those tights hugged him in all the right places, and Kitty didn’t care. Peter Parker had a sexy ass.

 

She was getting sidetracked.

 

“Kitty?” MJ asked, waving a hand in front of her face. “Still with us?”

 

Kitty opened her mouth to respond when a knock sounded on the door.

 

“Um…Gwen?” Peter’s voice carried through the door, and Gwen was already on her feet when he continued. “I hope I’m not inter—oh, hey.”

 

Gwen yanked open the door and smiled at him, taking his hands. “Hey,” she said. “Everything okay?”

 

“Oh, wow, the gang’s all here,” he said, smiling wanly into the room, and they all waved, Kitty blowing him a kiss. “Am I interrupting anything?”

 

“No, we’re just holding one of our meetings, like I said,” Gwen said with a smirk. “Remember? We all just talk about how cute and adorable you are.”

 

“Of course, how could I forget?” Pete asked wryly, his eyes darting over the assembled girls. “I was just poking at some new web-shooter designs and…I dunno, got attacked by the gloom or something.”  


“Well, get in here,” Jess said, scampering forward and shutting the door as she ushered Pete to the bed. “We’ll chase that gloom away, hm?”

 

“I was thinking about…this is gonna sound dumb,” Pete said, and Kitty huffed, scooting out of the way so he could flop onto the bed before scooting to sit near his head.

 

“Pete, tell us,” she insisted, and Pete gave her that heart-melting smile that made this whole strange setup worth it. She had to share him with four other girls, but Pete had this way of looking at her that made her feel like even if that were true, she was still the world to him, like his life was this complex puzzle, but she was one of the pieces that held it all together.

 

“Uncle Ben was once like…neck-deep in trying to fix this old ham radio his dad gave him and…and my dad,” he said. “This thing was like…a piece of their childhood, I guess. And he was trying to get it going, but he was always kind of the…the DJ back in the day. He and Dad actually spent a few summers running this ridiculous radio station that called Park It With The Parkers.”

 

“Ugh, that’s where you got your pun-work from,” Jess said, and Pete grinned.

 

“I am who I am,” he said, and they all laughed. “So…Uncle Ben wasn’t the tech guy. That was Dad. And he was…he was just so bummed. He wanted to fix this thing up and show it to me, but he just couldn’t, and…I think that’s the first time I saw Uncle Ben so frustrated with the fact that…he wasn’t the tech whizz Dad was. He wanted so much to be the best dad he could to me. So I hopped onto the seat next to him and took a look at this thing, and I could see right away he just hadn’t wired it quite right. So I looked up at him and told him what he’d gotten wrong, you know…as nice as I knew how.”

 

Kitty was running her fingers through his hair at this point, mesmerized as she tended to get whenever Peter took a moment to talk about his past. He had a way of drawing her in, and she wondered if it was just her or something he did to girls that were into his “type”. Judging from the transfixed look the others were giving him, she guessed the latter.

 

“And he looks at me,” Pete went on, “and he looks back at this radio, and he just kinda chuckles, and he says ‘Well, how about that, Pete, you’re right.’ And he rewires the thing, and it works perfectly. And…we turned it on and did a special broadcast of Park It With The Parkers. He played some Beatles songs, and I talked about…trains.” He chuckled at the memory, shaking his head in disbelief at his younger self. “I was so into trains back then.”

 

Aw, Pete…. Kitty just continued toying gently with his hair, wiping at her eyes.

 

“And later on, we went back upstairs, and Uncle Ben went to shower or something, and I went to get a snack from the kitchen,” Pete said. “Aunt May had some cookies cooling on the table, and I kinda tried to sneak one, but she totally knew, because she like always knew when I was trying to get a cookie. She just turned to me, and she says, ‘I listened to the most interesting radio show about trains today.’ And she was totally listening the whole time Uncle Ben and I were doing our thing.”

 

His voice was thick with emotion at this point, and as one, the five girls clambered onto the bed around him and just surrounded him in a circle of loving support.

 

“That’s adorable,” Gwen said with a grin. “Wait…you’re the one who told her about the thing where Japanese trains are crazy on-time?”

 

“Yeah,” Pete said with a laugh. “If they’re more than five minutes late, there’s like…panic in the streets and stuff.”

 

“Pete, she told that to _everyone_ ,” MJ said from his left side. “She told that to me that time I was over for dinner.”

 

“Same,” Jess said, nuzzling into his chest. “She told that to me that time we were having tea while you were tidying up your room.”

 

Pete grinned around at them, and Kitty felt him slumping into the mattress, his head pillowed in her lap.

 

“You guys are…awesome,” he said. “Is it lazy to just say I love all of you?”

 

“No, not at all.”

 

“No way, Pete.”

 

“Love you, too.”

 

“Only kinda, but love you.”

 

“Pete, you’re too cute, and I love you so much.”

 

……

 

He hated this.

 

He knew Osnick would be unhappy; he just knew it. The plan hadn’t gone through as it had been meticulously laid out, and now they would have to face the repercussions as Oliver Osnick contended with the fact that he was in fact fallible.

 

That was like trying to tell a walrus it was enormous while it vehemently tried to deny the fact.

 

“Doctor?” Hobie asked as he stepped into the room. “Doctor Osnick?”

 

“I am here, Mr. Brown,” Osnick said, standing in front of an array of televisions screens. All of the screens were showing various different stations covering the recent attack on the X-Mansion. The light from the displays was reflected in his black goggles. “It would seem things didn’t go quite as planned.”

 

“The X-Men are…well, hard to kill,” Hobie said. “You scattered them, at least.”

 

“Scattered is…workable,” Osnick said flatly. “I would rather I exterminated them, but that will come in due time. Have you heard any more on Kaine?”

 

“He’s…planning something,” Hobie said. “That’s all I’ve been able to figure out. He has some loyal guys working with him. This Spidercide guy has…eliminated everything we’ve sent at him.”

 

“This is…botherous,” Osnick said. “Were it only I’d eliminated those abominations when I had the chance. Nevermind. Our plans move ahead as they were meant to. Phase Two begins in a week’s time.”

 

“Sir,” Hobie said, and Osnick turned his reflective gaze on him. “Doctor, if I may. Kaine is planning something…soon. We don’t know, but it’s soon. What if ‘soon’ is closer than a week?”

 

“My dear Mr. Brown,” Osnick said, “if there is one thing that can be counted on, it’s that no one will be able to outsmart Dr. Ot—Oliver Osnick. Now, you may return to your quarters. I have much to prepare and precious little time to do so.”

 

“Yes, sir,” Hobie said. “If I may, how’s your daughter? She’s been a bit moody lately.”

 

“She is…nursing a bit of hero-worship for this Neighborhood Watch,” Osnick said distastefully. “I’ve taken measures to dissuade her from such notions, and she is…balking. Nothing that a stern hand can’t handle. Dismissed.”

 

Hobie nodded and backed from the room, sighing as the door hissed shut behind him. It was always unnerving, talking to the doctor, and more so lately. It was like talking to a body-snatcher or something, a man who was only pretending to be a man. Hobie only stuck around out of a sense of loyalty. He wasn’t sure if Osnick was ever going to deliver on his promise of a world without kings, without rulers. All Hobie really wanted was true freedom, where the only thing stopping a man from getting what he wanted was his own ambition.

 

Was that really so bad?


	15. Chapter 15

“So, what are we doing here?” Julie asked as she and Riley rode on the elevator down into the deeper underground floors of Oscorp. May (Riley’s alternate-timeline…niece of sorts) rode with them, along with May’s alternate-timeline mother, Emma Frost, who was coolly appraising her nails as they zoomed downward. Though she didn’t say anything, Mayday could feel her psychic reach filling the little lift car. She wasn’t actively reading any minds, but she was doing nothing to block any stray thoughts she might pick up. Just as Mayday remembered her mother back in her old life, Emma Frost had nary a trace of concern for the privacy of others’ minds. In fact, May could feel her cold amusement at Julie’s devotion to Riley, her piqued curiosity at the snarl of emotions that was Riley’s mind. It was basically Dad’s, with a dose of identity-crisis-induced angst, and if there was one thing Emma Frost loved, it was angst.

 

That never changed.

 

“It’s rude to read other people’s minds, you know,” Emma said, and Mayday rolled her eyes.

 

“Hard not to, when you’re basically broadcasting it to the whole elevator,” she drawled right back.

 

“I would think you would show your mother a bit more respect,” Emma said, a smirk curling her lips.

 

“Ha!” Mayday let a sarcastic little laugh. “You take a good look at the type of person you are and tell me you’d be the type of mom that deserves any kind of respect.”

 

Emma scowled at her, but Mayday could feel the grudging respect her comment had earned; Emma was a sarcastic, frosty bitch, and she was glad she’d raised a girl that was at least one of those.

 

Mayday was neither frosty nor a bitch, but if she had inherited one thing from Peter Parker and Emma Frost-Parker, it was a blistering sense of sarcasm.

 

With a muted ding, they arrived at their destination.

 

“ _Sub-basement level 7-B, Ready-Room_ ,” Jarvis announced as the doors slid open. “ _Please be advised that the area beyond the Ready-Room entrance is a live-fire zone. Proceed at your own discretion_.”

 

“Are the others here already, Jarvis?” Riley asked as they stepped into the brightly lit concrete hallway. Mayday was reminded of a military bunker, sturdy and utilitarian. The halogen lights brightened everything until they were all but washed of color, like one of those bleak action movies that had been making the rounds in this time period.

 

“ _The other members of the Neighborhood Watch arrived twenty minutes previous_ ,” Jarvis said. “ _Young Mr. Osborn is already expressing impatience for your arrival._ ”

 

“Tell him we’re ten minutes out,” Riley said with a giggle. “I wanna mess with him.”

 

“ _I will inform him_ ,” Jarvis said, his voice as dry as ever. Mayday grinned back at Riley, who winked as Julie hugged at her arm.

 

“You are such a sassy little bitch sometimes, and I love it,” Julie said, kissing Riley on the cheek.

 

The quartet made their way down the hallway, their footsteps echoing off the barren walls. Mayday giggled a bit when she felt a barb of annoyance off of Harry’s brain before they stepped into the Ready-Room.

 

“…minutes!?” Harry shouted. “Augh, I wanna start now, and they…they’re here.”

 

Riley smirked and wiggled her fingers in a little wave at Harry, who just rolled his eyes.

 

“Well-played,” he admitted while the rest of the Watch chuckled behind him. Dad…Peter was standing near a wall with Gwen and Jess, who were chatting while he watched with a fond smile on his face. His brain seemed pleasantly mellow today, which was a relief. Kitty and Bobby were having a heated argument about something (a TV series they were both watching, but Mayday didn’t eavesdrop any more than she could help) while Flash and Johnny just chatted about the same show much more civilly nearby. Lana and Jubilee sat nearly equidistant between Harry and Peter, both tapping away at their phones and blowing identical pink bubbles which even popped at the same time.

 

It was almost frightening, how well those two got along.

 

Rounding out the group were Cindy Moon and MJ, who were poring over an album of photos that Peter and Riley had taken during their trip to Flushing Meadows the other day.

 

“Where are Miles and Ganke?” Mayday asked.

 

“And your brother,” Riley said, glancing over at Julie. “I think he’s only shown up for one patrol.”

 

“He’s…not really about the superhero life, I think,” Julie said with an apologetic shrug. “He joined up with the basketball team, and he’s like their star player now.”

 

“And can he be trusted to keep quiet?” Riley asked cautiously, and Julie nodded.

 

“Oh, he knows what’ll happen if he blabs,” she said with a dangerous gleam in her eye, her thoughts seeming to latch protectively onto Riley.

 

She _really_ cared about Mayday’s auntie.

 

“Alright, we’re all here,” Pete said, standing and making his way toward the center of the Ready-Room, which looked rather like the Danger Room back at the X-Mansion. Mayday had only seen the 2037 version, but the same principle of a large featureless white room the approximate size of a football field seemed to hold true.

 

Did this room sport hard-light holograms as well? The technology should have been around in this day and age. In fact, she knew of a few contemporary supervillains that made use of said technology. If a man like the Tinkerer could create it, surely Tony Stark or some other genius of this time could….

 

Her mind was wandering.

 

“What about Miles and Ganke?” Cindy asked, and Peter checked his phone.

 

“They’re on the way,” he said. “They got a little hung up on patrol.”

 

“They’re hiding something,” Cindy said, folding her arms and peering over at him. MJ nodded from behind her.

 

“They’ve been, like…really shifty lately,” she said. “They almost never meet up with Bobby, Flash, and me when we’re all out on patrol.”

 

“I’ve already talked to them about it,” Riley interjected, stepping forward to stand next to Pete. “They said they found something, but they didn’t wanna worry anyone before they got more details.”

 

“Sounds like two _other_ people we know,” Gwen said with a pointed look at the pair in the middle of the room, who only responded with twin shrugs.

 

They really were so very similar in every way. Mayday could hear the others in the room still marveling at the fact, even after the months that Riley had been alive. Behind her, Emma was getting a fresh dose of it, muted a bit by the fact that she had known neither of the pair before a few days ago. Having a female clone of your best friend show up out of nowhere was downright jarring; seeing what amounted to fraternal twins was merely generally interesting.

 

Her mind was wandering again.

 

“So, what are we doing here, anyway?” Emma asked, and Mayday almost laughed at the way nearly every girl in the room seemed to bristle at the question.

 

“That’s a good question, Emma,” Kitty asked. “What _are_ you – “

 

“We are here,” Peter overrode her, and Kitty huffed as he patted her hand, “because if something big is happening, we should be ready. Kitty and Jess have told me a lot about this Danger Room you guys have at the X-Mansion.”

 

“So, we thought we could use this place as one,” Riley said. “It doesn’t have quite all the bells and whistles, but, you know….”

 

“It’ll do to gauge our strengths and upper limits,” Peter went on. Mayday could sense the amusement from the rest of the group, watching the two breathlessly trade off their little bit of exposition. Their brains were so in sync. Even in her own time, Dad and Auntie Riley’s brains often followed some of the same paths, but it had been harder to tell with Venom and Carnage clouding their minds. Here, it was just the boy and his clone, with brains that shared fifteen years of life-experience and very similar subsequent adventures. May could almost hear their minds thinking in tandem more often than not.

 

“So, where do we start?” Flash asked from the back of the group, and Pete pointed at him.

 

“Good question,” he said. “I was thinking we divide into groups and – “

 

“ _Apologies for the interruption, Mr. Parker_ ,” Jarvis said. _“You told me to inform you if Misters Morales and Lee arrived, and they have just entered the elevator_.”

 

“How are they?” Peter asked, his brain shifting from placidly relaxed to business mode.

 

“ _Miles Morales seems agitated, and Ganke Lee is attempting to calm him_ ,” Jarvis said. “ _They’ve just told me to inform you to suit up_.”

 

“You heard him,” Peter said, hopping to his feet and stripping out of his clothes to reveal his suit already on underneath. “Jarvis, how long until they – “

 

“ _Right now_ ,” Jarvis said as the elevator doors opened, and Miles charged out, whipping his mask from his face.

 

“Pete, we have a fucking problem,” he said, hurrying over to Pete and staring up at him in a panic.

 

“Alright,” was all Peter said. “Deep breath, collect yourself, and then talk.”

 

Miles paused, but from the snarl of thoughts in his head, Mayday could hear and see the last few hours, and she gasped at what he’d been through.

 

“Oh, no,” she muttered, to curious looks from Julie and Gwen, who were nearby. Emma, who had seen the same images no doubt, seemed only mildly curious.

 

“Okay, so…the tip we got,” Miles said. “We got it from Spidercide.”

 

“Oh, fuck,” Riley grumbled.

 

“He’s…I really think he’s trying to help us with something, but his mind is all kindsa snarled up from – “

 

“The Witches Three,” Riley said, nodding. “That’s what he called them.”

 

“Sounds like a psychic fucked with his head,” Peter nodded. “Go on.”

 

“So, we called that Edpool guy, since he was after Kaine, too,” Miles said, and Peter nodded again.

 

“Makes sense,” he said. “That’s where you went the other night?”

 

“We found some warehouse,” Miles said. “Something big. He’s…. Edpool cased the neighborhood, found out that a bunch of trucks were driving in and out of the place for weeks, and a lot of them had the same logo, some kind of old box company called BoxIt or something, not important. They went under a few months ago, sold a bunch of their trucks. Edpool tracked a bunch of the purchases to some offshore account, but they all bounce back to a place in Brooklyn, some old medical research place.”

 

“Did you check it out?” Peter asked, and Miles nodded.

 

“It was…it was deserted, but look,” he said, pulling out his phone. He showed something to Peter, and Mayday couldn’t help but glance into his brain, through his eyes, at a hastily spray-painted message on a tile wall: “ _COME AND FIND ME. WHERE IT ALL BEGAN_ ”.

 

“Where it all began,” Peter asked, his mind starting to race. Mayday tried to follow the connections forming, but some brains worked too fast even for her to follow. “No….”

 

“Fuck…” Riley gasped. “No, no, that…it’s impossible.”

 

“I think we’re past ‘impossible’ at this point,” Peter said, glancing around as Mayday tried to make sense of the conclusion he’d drawn.

 

She’d never come across this sort of thing in her timeline.

 

“Alright, Miles, what do we know about whatever Kaine’s planning?” Peter asked, and Miles shook his head.

 

“Whatever that blue stuff he was working with actually is, the world has no idea it exists,” he said. “It’s not in any database anywhere, and even Connors has no clue what it is.”

 

“Okay, send a team back to that research clinic and another back to that apartment complex,” Peter said, pulling his mask on. “Figure out everything you can about this bomb Kaine’s planning to _use and stop it_.”

 

He turned to Mayday, who squeaked a bit, as she tended to whenever Dad had gotten intense with her back home. She reminded herself that this wasn’t the Venom-addled Dad that was prone to bouts of blinding rage, just a rather frantic Peter Parker who frankly needed a vacation.

 

“ _Mayday_ ,” he said. “ _You…politely ask if Emma would be willing to join you and track down Spidercide. You can see a psychically messed-with head, right_?”

 

“Like a mile off,” Emma said, strolling to Mayday’s side and glancing down at her in amusement. “Ready for some mother-daughter bonding time?”

 

Not even kinda, but it had to be done.

 

“That’s the spirit,” Emma said.

 

“Where are we going, Pete?” Gwen asked, stepping up to his side with a determined look, and Pete sighed, glancing around at them.

 

“ _Gwen, Harry, Julie_ ,” he said. “ _You’re coming with Riley and I to Wharton State Forest_.”

 

“Oh…” Gwen gasped with a look at Riley, who just pulled her own mask over her face.

 

“ _Yeah_ ,” she said. “ _Oh_.”

 

……

 

George hated when things felt like just another day at the office.

 

Not that he hated the sense of monotony or found things boring; quite the opposite. He just knew that about the time things seemed to settle, something huge was going to happen. He’d been with the NYPD for nearly twenty years and had been a citizen of the Big Apple four almost twice as long. New York City was never boring, it was just biding its time between bouts of mind-bending weirdness.

 

“George,” Jean said, poking her head into his office with a smile. “Lunch? Wanna hit that pizza place?”

 

“Ah, I’ll just stick with my bag lunch today,” George said, poking around at his computer like it would be able to put his mind at ease. All he found were more and more accounts of strange activities that would be perfectly normal on their own. A missing person (sadly a daily occurrence), an upsurge in drug activity, suspicious vehicle activity. On their own, they wouldn’t be worth looking at twice, but now….

 

“I know that look,” Jean said, stepping into his office and closing the door. “George Stacy has picked up the scent.”

 

“Something’s…happening, Jean,” George said. “I don’t know why, I can just…feel it.”

 

“You’ve been Captain for a long time,” Jean said. “You’ve earned the right to go with your gut once in a while. What do you need me to do?”

 

“That’s the problem,” George said. “I don’t know.”

 

He felt like a cat that knew an earthquake was about to happen but had no idea what to do about it. It was that all-consuming feeling that something was just _off_ , but he couldn’t put his finger on it and thus didn’t know how to react.

 

His phone rang.

 

“Captain Stacy,” he said as he pressed the handset to his ear.

 

“ _This is the Black Widow_ ,” Gwen’s voice came, and George immediately sat up in his seat, opening a fresh Word document, ready to take notes. Gwen only used her superhero moniker when things were serious.

 

“I’m listening,” he said.

 

“ _One of my associates, Ricochet, is on the way with a friend of his, Phage_ ,” Gwen said. “ _We really, really need your cooperation. They have equipment we’ve rigged up to track traces of a chemical we’ve found might be involved in a biological attack on New York City_.”

 

“I see,” he said, typing down some pertinent information. “Do you think this might be a terrorist threat?”

 

“ _I…I think you have a good reason to…to be careful_ ,” Gwen said, and George had to take a deep breath at the way her voice broke over the phone. “ _Ricochet and Phage have explicit instructions to keep the Captain safe_.”

 

“Well, I know I’m in good hands, then,” George said, and he heard a nervously breathy laugh over the phone as a knock came at his door. “I believe your friends have arrived. Thank you for the tip, Black Widow.”

 

“ _Stay safe_ ,” Gwen said, and there was a click as the line cut off. George knew Gwen was worried about him, of course. He was just a regular human up against the super-powered worst New York had to offer, and something big was about to happen.

 

All George could think about, though, was how he would tan Parker’s hide if any harm came to his little girl.

 

……

 

My ears are burning in the worst possible way.

 

Gwen cuts out the private line she had with the police station her father runs, and I can tell from her body language that she’s terrified for George’s safety. Miles and Ganke were told by no less than five different Watch members to never let Captain Stacy out of their sight for longer than it took to blink, but that doesn’t stop her from worrying, and I’m sure Gwen’s father is just as worried for her safety.

 

I can’t blame him.

 

But there is no way any harm is coming to Gwen, not with Riley _and_ myself on watch. Not to mention Harry, who has been friends with her for nearly as long as I have, and Julie, who may not be personally friends with much of us but guards _anything_ Riley values with fierce protectiveness.

 

Okay, so there are a few somewhat _unhealthy_ relationships floating around, but frankly, we just haven’t had the time to really work things out the way we should.

 

“You okay, Pete?” Gwen asks me, glancing up at me with concern evident on her face. “It’s not…you know, too soon, is it?”

 

Too soon since I held Aunt May in my arms as she died?

 

It’s probably gonna be years before “too soon” is out of the cards, but we don’t have years. We don’t even have days.

 

We barely have hours.

 

“Let’s just stop Kaine before he can rip New York a new one,” I say, not answering her question.  Honestly, I’m trying not to think too much about…what happened.

 

It crops up enough on its own these days.

 

Like right now. The glassy gray eyes that have haunted some of the worst nightmares I’ve been having lately just mix with the lovely early-morning dreams Mayday’s been letting me linger on, and it’s just Aunt May, staggering zombie-like through the kitchen with a plate of moldy, maggot-infested wheatcakes, slamming them on the table in front of me.

 

_“You should have saved me. Then I could make you a proper breakfast before you left me and went to pay attention to New York and not your own aunt!”_

 

I shake my head, and the hazy interior of the helicopter swims before me before coalescing. That’s not Aunt May, I tell myself. Aunt May was proud of me. She said so. In her last moments. Before dying.

 

In my arms.

 

The helicopter touches down, and there’s no time to grieve. There’s never time to grieve. Uncle Ben once mentioned a friend of his he knew that had served in the Vietnam war. He’d watched his best friend die from a shot right through the head in the middle of a gunfight. He’d had to carry on and fight, trudging on for weeks before he’d managed to find time to actually come to terms with what had happened.

 

I can sympathize. Aunt May hasn’t even been dead for a month, Uncle Ben only about eight. In that time, I’ve become a superhero, been through all sorts of colorful adventures, watched the only parents I’ve known die, and now I’m about to stop what could be the worst disaster to strike New York in sixteen years.

 

If I’m lucky.

 

“ _Wharton State Forest_ ,” Riley grumbles from next to me, and I reach out. She latches a hand onto mine, clinging tightly enough that I’m afraid for a second that we might web our hands together. “ _Where…I was born_.”

 

“ _You were born fifteen years ago in a hospital in Manhattan_ ,” I tell her. “ _We both were_.”

 

“ _Oh…shut up_ ,” she says with a small laugh as we make our way toward the all-too-familiar building. Around us, the forest is eerily quiet, or perhaps I’m just too used to the hustle and bustle of New York. One of the most densely packed cities in the country is bound to leave someone a bit unaccustomed to real, actual silence.

 

“ _It’s so quiet_ ,” Riley observes, and I just nod, not even bothering to voice what I was just thinking.

 

She knows already.

 

“ _Not gonna lie, I was expecting, like…guards and like sentry turrets and robots and shit_ ,” Harry says, following behind us.

 

“ _Kaine left that message for us_ ,” I say.

 

“ _He_ wants _us to find him_ ,” Riley adds.

 

“ _Shouldn’t that be a reason to be worried_?” Julie asks, and Riley and I shrug.

 

“ _All we can do is hope whatever he has planned for us is enough for us to handle_ ,” I say.

 

“ _And if it’s not, improvise_ ,” Riley finishes.

 

We make our way to a small entrance set into a brick shack, a long hallway leading to a tower connected to the main facility, the one I was kidnapped to so long ago, the one Riley escaped months later.

 

And the one Kaine is using as a base of operations, because it’s the first place he likely remembers.

 

“ _Hard to believe I’m back_ ,” Riley says, squeezing my hand tighter, and I return the gesture.

 

“ _We’re here to kick ass and then go home and take a serious vacation_ ,” I say.

 

“ _You were already supposed to_ be _on vacation_ ,” Gwen grumbles, shaking her head. “ _I’m gonna have to kick Kaine’s ass myself for dragging you into this_.”

 

“ _That’ll be a sight, at least_ ,” Riley chuckles as we step into the small shack, staring down the hallway to the darkened staircase that spirals down out of sight at the other end.

 

“ _Anyone else getting a creepy Bioshock vibe_?” Harry asks.

 

“ _I was thinking Slenderman, but that works, too_ ,” Riley answers softly, the two of us taking the lead. She releases my hand, and I see her fingers curling at her sides, ready to web up anything that jumps out at us. As we near the staircase, lights spring up, almost blinding us, but the auto-polarization in our masks’ lenses kick in, muting the shock. Riley and I peer around for any danger while Julie and Gwen check the rear, Harry grabbing out his hoverboard in disk form and wheeling around for a target. After a few moments of no attack, we all calm just a bit.

 

“ _Movement sensor_?” I ask, taking a tentative step closer. My spider-sense isn’t giving me any feedback, and I glance at Gwen, who shakes her head.

 

“ _No head-tingles here_ ,” she says.

 

Well, if Gwen’s extra-sensitive spider-sense isn’t reacting, maybe Kaine’s just lighting the way. From the few snippets we’ve gotten from Spidercide, he doesn’t seem to have any malicious intent toward us directly. His plans just happen to (allegedly) be the total annihilation of New York by chemical agent.

 

And that sort of puts him in conflict with us.

 

I take the lead down the stairs, Riley directly behind, and I hear her sigh a bit.

 

“ _Trippy memories of your first moments as a girl_?” I ask.

 

“ _There’s not enough badly written fan fiction in the world to prepare you for it_ ,” she says.

 

“ _That’s one question answered, at least_ ,” I say. “ _I’d hate it_.”

 

“ _It has its moments, but mostly yeah_ ,” she says.

 

“ _Are you seriously talking about gender-swap issues while we’re trying to stop a chemical attack on New York City_?” Julie asks, and we shrug simultaneously.

 

“ _Nervous chatter_ ,” I say.

 

“ _You know how it goes_ ,” Riley tells her, and Julie just lets a breath of amusement through her nose.

 

“ _This is my first doomsday scenario_ ,” she said. “ _I didn’t know that still applied_.”

 

“ _It always applies_ ,” I say, stumbling a bit as I reach level ground, having been ready for another step. Spider reflexes kick in and help me gracefully recover, seeing a long, brightly lit hallway. The cement walls and floors are actually rather well-kept, with halogen lights set into the ceiling lighting the whole place. About six doors are set along the hall, several yards apart, and while most of them are simple metal affairs, a couple have what look like keycard sliders set next to them.

 

“ _At least Kaine cleaned the place up_ ,” Riley says.

 

“ _Yeah, but that means he_ used _the place, too_ ,” I point out, and she nods, obviously having just thought of the same thing. The more time we spend together, the more our brains seem to sync up, and it’s all I can do not to let myself get caught in a feedback loop, like she’s probably doing right now. In fact, we once made a safety word to sort of jar us apart in case our brains started to merge onto the same path. She’s probably thinking of it right now –

 

“ _Strawberries_ ,” we say in unison, and I think of something she doesn’t know, of the girls, the setup we all have, of quiet mornings with Mary Jane and Jess, of Lana’s annoyed but loving glances whenever I say something that tickles her romantic side.

 

“ _Okay_ ,” Riley says, and I do _not_ try to guess what she’s thinking. “ _Let’s go. I…woke up in the room down here_.”

 

She leads the way, Julie hurrying to walk by her side, and I follow with Harry and Gwen in tow. The door opens as she approaches, but none of us get even the slightest buzz of spider-sense. With one glance back at me, Riley sees me nod and heads into the room, the rest of us behind her.

 

We enter and see a man standing in front of a display of television screens, showing readouts of various devices, security footage of the Neighborhood Watch going about saving the city, live footage of news stations, and even just a couple of screen-savers. The man himself is tall with a lithe musculature, wearing a specially-tailored lab coat to accommodate for the two extra sets of arms sprouting from his sides. He turns toward us, and I hear three gasps as Harry, Gwen, and Julie see the all-too-familiar face, like mine plus a few years of hard road. Kaine hasn’t shaved recently, and his hair is getting a bit shaggy, but those baby-blue eyes glitter with mirth, a pleased smile on his face as he glances at me.

 

“Peter,” he says in a hauntingly familiar voice, and I take a moment to ponder that that’s what I’ll sound like once I work my way through puberty. “You made it.”

 

……

 

It was so strange to be back in the city. After so much time wandering the rural reaches of the United States, strolling along country roads into fields and pastures that stretched on until it felt like the civilization was just a distant memory, being here, back in the thick of it, was…jarring. But Dr. Banner had insisted that it would be okay, that Tim had things well under control. There hadn’t been an “incident” since his last unfortunate episode in this very city, where a boy he’d later learned called himself Spider-Man had kicked his ass with a hammer of legend.

 

That was still something that was just funny to think about, in a cosmic sort of way. And Tim did love to laugh. When he was laughing, the Other Guy felt miles away, like a distant memory he could hope to forget someday.

 

“Dum-Dum,” a voice said behind him, and Tim wheeled around to see Bruce standing there with a placid smile on his face. “Been a while.”

 

“Bruce,” Tim said, stepping in and gripping Bruce’s hand, yanking him in for a hug. “Too long.”

 

“You look good,” Bruce said, stepping back and looking Tim up and down. “How’s the…Other Guy been treating you?”

 

“He hasn’t,” Tim said with a smile. “Been doing like you said, Doc. Thinking about life and how there’s really nothing to let myself get bent out of shape over. And I…been talking to Madison. I can’t thank you enough for convincing Sherry to talk to me.”

 

“I didn’t,” Bruce said, sounding surprised. “She called you?”

 

“Yeah,” Tim said with a little chuckle. “Guess she did.”

 

……

 

“ _Kaine_ ,” I say, and he chuckles, nodding.

 

“That’s me,” he says with a grin. “You’ll have to forgive me; I was in a bit of a…dark place when I picked my name. I was feeling a bit biblical, and by the time my outlook had brightened, it stuck. So…yes, I’m Kaine. It’s…good to finally meet you. I knew you’d find me eventually. Frankly, that last clue was a bit…overt, but I just couldn’t _wait_ to show you what I’ve been working on.”

 

“ _A chemical bomb of some kind_?” I ask. “ _Gonna wipe out New York with some specially-made super virus_?”

 

“What?” Kaine asked, sounding genuinely shocked. “Oh, Peter, no. No, this isn’t some mad scientist’s bid to show the world what he’s created, to…parade his superior intelligence and demand the world’s subjugation or…worse, accept a simple payoff and slink away with a smug little smile. Peter, what I’m doing is girding the world for darker days. There are those that would use your brilliant brain for much more sinister purposes. All I’ve done is…subverted them.”

 

“ _My brilliant brain_ ,” I say, the words bitter as I speak them. “ _Because you got a copy_.”

 

Kaine smiles a sad sort of smile, nodding at me. “Yes,” he says. “I was another of the batch of failed clones Octavius cooked up. I believe he was attempting to craft a clone that had an extra set of arms, much as he had in his original form, but I turned out a bit to…spidery for his tastes. Glossy black eyes, far too much body hair, and…fangs.” He gives a little gnash of his teeth, chuckling at Riley. “I trust you saw what I made of poor Max Gargan, yes, sister?”

 

“ _You ripped his throat out_ ,” Riley says. “ _Not exactly brag-worthy_.”

 

“Yes, my methods were…more than a bit barbaric,” he confesses with a sheepish smile. “As I said, I wasn’t quite in a good place mentally back then. I did make an attempt to fix myself up, to…look a bit more like my forebear, but there was a small…side effect.” He holds his arms out at his sides. “It’s been quite…handy, though.”

 

He’s met with utter silence, and I know I’m rolling my eyes behind my mask.

 

“Forgive me,” he apologizes. “A terrible pun. Another trait I inherited from you.”

 

“ _What are you planning to do to New York_?” Gwen asks, stepping forward, and Kaine nods.

 

“Of course, of course,” he saidsays “Don’t worry, all will become clear. The blue crystals that you found, the chemical mixture I’m planning to release onto the citizens of fair New York, is an ancient compound that hasn’t been used in thousands of years, since Man was taking its first tentative steps toward sentience and civilization. You see, long, long ago, Earth was…visited. By an alien race known as the Kree.”

 

“ _Aliens_?” Harry snorts derisively. “ _Okay_.”

 

“You are currently in a room with two clones of your best friend, and all of us have spider powers given by bites from radioactive super-spiders,” Kaine says flatly. “I believe the time for skepticism has long since passed, Harry.”  
  
Harry shrugs, but he just gives a little nod. It sort of makes sense.

 

“There’s…quite a bit more to tell, but I can see you’re getting impatient,” Kaine says. “These alien beings, these Kree…experimented on Man. They saw our potential for mutation and sought to weaponize it, to control it. They modified us, filled in the blank spaces in our genetic strains where there was room for mutation. And they tied these new mutations to a specific catalyst.”

 

“ _The blue stuff_ ,” I guess.

 

“Precisely,” Kaine says insistently. “These new humans, these…inhumans are still around. The trait has been passed down through generations, just as mutant abilities have, but they’ve lacked the trigger, the key. Through meticulous research and study, I’ve found it. I discovered a repository of Terrigen crystals, and I discovered the exact sequence of events needed to release the Terrigen mist. Once breathed in, the inhumans will start to manifest. And with their powers, they will be able to put a stop to the dark machinations of our…our fallen brother.”

 

“ _Fallen brother_?” I ask.

 

“Did you never once wonder what was to be gained through all of this?” Kaine asks, gesturing around at the room, at the busted cloning tanks, at the facility in general. “What did Octavius stand to profit from going to all of this trouble, capturing you and cloning you? Did you not once stop to ponder what he’s been _up_ to? I know you’ve run into his lackeys, and I know that…our dear Spidercide has run into you from time to time.”

 

……

 

“There he is!”

 

The words were spoken so quickly, and his senses should have warned him, should have spoken, but his mind was not as woken. When he tried to think too hard, things snarled and spiraled, spinning and pulling at the dark recesses of the black matter of his mind. It was like driving full-speed on an icy road, things going so well until he tried to correct his course, and then spinning, turning, longing, yearning.

 

He grasped and pulled and tugged the air, clung to that which wasn’t there. Floated and bobbed, bloated and robbed. His mind felt like too much had been crammed in, but the excess was just white noise, muddling things up and stopping him. Always stopping, always stalling, always tripping, always falling.

 

“Oh, he is in a majorly bad way,” that voice said, and as it tickled his ears, he felt a mad sort of longing, a need to protect, to shield, to defect, to yield. “Hey. I’m Mayday. Can you hear me?”

 

“Darling daughter,” he said. “How? I know, I can see, but how can this be?”

 

“I…I have this weird connection to spiders,” Mayday said. “Through the Great Web. It’s complicated okay? But…we’re gonna fix your head, alright?”

 

“Fix…” he said, turning in the air. There was no gravity, no ground, no up, no down. There was only a blissful floating sensation.

 

It was quite nice.

 

“Are you ready?” Mayday asked, but it was just a silly question.

 

To be ready implied that you weren’t before. To ready yourself meant girding for that for which you weren’t prepared. He had nothing to prepare for because there was no before, no after, there was only now. Now and maybe later, but –

 

Strings. Strings being pulled apart, straightened, untangled. Connections he couldn’t believe he hadn’t been able to see suddenly made all the sense in the world and—sense!  


It was such a delightful thing!

 

The webs were tangled, but instead of brushing them away, it felt like they were simply pulling them apart and weaving them instead into something that made sense.

 

“Why not just gut him and start fresh?” a cold, Frosty voice said.

 

“Because he’s not just some minion,” darling Mayday said. “He’s a person, just one that’s had a bit of a rough time.”

 

His mind…. He had a mind! It could think, it could do, it could ponder, power through!

 

“My dearest daughter,” he said. “Let me down, please.”

 

He was carefully spun and placed on his feet, wide eyes staring around at the world with newfound comprehension. New York City. He was in New York City. He was…Spidercide? But that didn’t fit at all. There was but one spider to kill and….

 

“We must go!” he said, turning to Mayday, who looked up at him in shock. “There is scarcely time to waste, we must go, we must make haste!”

 

“What’s happening?” Mayday asked. “What’s going on?”

 

“No, no,” he said. “Not going on. Going off. Kaine wants him, only him. He has forgotten what he set out to do, only seeks to ruin him.”

 

“Who?”

 

……

 

“Oliver Osnick,” Kaine said. “Curious, how similar that name is, hm?”

 

“ _To…Otto Octavius_ ,” I say.

 

“Exactly,” Kaine said with a nod. “No doubt his plan was a long con. Trick New York into thinking he was just another science type with the city’s best interests at heart and slowly gain more and more traction. I think he eventually planned to lure the city into having no other choice but to follow his lead or be trampled underfoot.”

 

“ _He…he stuck his brain in a clone body_?” I ask, trying to follow. Kaine seems to be dragging me along through his explanations, leaving out important bits along the way and hoping I catch up.

 

“Ah, but there’s the rub,” Kaine says with a wry grin. “He didn’t physically place his brain in the new body. He copied his brainwaves. He only _tricked_ our lost brother into _thinking_ he was Octavius before setting him loose. The man that’s running around attempting to lay waste to the city is a Parker, _fooled_ into thinking he’s an Octavius! And this cannot stand!”

 

“ _Why didn’t you just stop him_?” Riley asks. “ _Why go to all of this trouble with bombs and stuff_?”

 

While she’s speaking, I glance around the room. There are no visible controls to set the bombs of, just a set of screens and the old, busted-out clone tanks. All we can do is hope to stall him long enough for Miles and Ganke to help Captain Stacy find the bombs.

 

“He’s quite unreachable,” Kaine admitted. “We made one attempt, but short of a full-scale assault with everything we’ve got, we can’t get to him, and as you’ve proven, our Stegron is quite susceptible to concerted attacks.”

 

“ _You could have come to us for help_ ,” I tell him. “ _You’re…not too different from me or Riley. Why not find us_?”

 

“Because, dear brother,” Kaine said, “I didn’t want to disturb you. You, who I owe my very life to. You have so much happening, so many tribulations to endure. How could I, in good conscience, add to the load. I…I heard about our Mother’s passing. You have my…deepest and most heartfelt sympathies.”

 

He looks so genuinely remorseful that for a moment all I can do is nod. “ _Yeah…thanks_ ,” I say.

 

“But you balanced the books, did you not?” he asks earnestly. “And isn’t that what matters? You saw an injustice, and you _corrected_ it! The world needs _more_ of that.”

 

“ _That was…a mistake_ ,” I say. “ _That wasn’t…._ ”

 

“No, Peter, no,” he says, his hands held out in a placating gesture. “Peter, that was…justice in its purest, rawest form. That was true justice, the simple recompense of a man that had been wronged only for trying to do what was right. The establishment wants to call it murder, vigilantism. They balk at the thought of someone taking their lawmaking into their own hands, from stealing their thunder, doing for free what they fatten their wallets with. They elevate themselves, climb atop their thrones and bask in the glory, but in reality, Peter…they fear that true superhumans like you and I will reveal them for what they are, will pull back the curtain to show the fumbling _nitwits_ pulling at levers and smashing buttons, desperate for a bite of glory.”

 

“ _And what do you plan to do to them_?” I ask, and he smirks.

 

“Plan?” he asks. “Peter, I’ve already done it. I’ve taken away their status, changed the winds. They cannot exercise their power when it is so diminished by _true_ strength, the power of the inhumans. Dear brother…control is an illusion. It’s one that too many people pretend themselves to have and one that innumerable more struggle to grasp. The police, the government, Osnick, the Maggia, the Kingpin. All of them fear what superhumans truly represent.”

 

“ _What do you mean, you’ve already done it_?” Riley asks, dread in her voice, and Kaine grins widely, showing snarling, sharp teeth.

 

“I’ve shown them that which they fear the most,” he says. “A world that is out of their control. A world that not only doesn’t _want_ to be reined in but _can’t_. Let them try, but at the end of the day, all they’ve done is attempt to build a house of cards. But with the slightest of breezes, they get to watch their tenuous grasp slip away.”

 

“ _What did you do_?” I ask, and he shakes his head.

 

“Peter,” he says, sounding like a teacher disappointed that his star pupil hasn’t figured out the answer yet. “Peter, you should know this. I’ve told you. The moment you set foot in this building, the bombs were already going off. New York City is awash in the Terrigen mist. The inhumans are awakening now, bursting from their cocoons, and soon…true justice will reign. Survival of the fittest, and there are many out there that are more fit than others. It’s going to be glorious.”  


_Thwip-thwip!_

 

I fire my webs at him, wrapping his many arms to his sides, but he only cackles, his entire form flickering for a moment before fading to reveal a mechanical tangle of limbs that topples to the floor. One of the screens along the wall shifts to show Kaine smiling at us.

 

“Oh, Peter,” he says, shaking his head and poking at the side of his skull. “Your brain. How many contingencies do you think I had in place? How many would you? No, I’m afraid I have more to do yet. Scores to settle. But don’t you worry. There are no traps, no aces in the hole. I want you to get out of there. I want you to come back and see the city. It’s only a testing ground, a petri dish. Soon, the Terrigen mist will engulf the world, and concepts of law, of order, will be the past. There will only be respect. Respect for those with powers. Respect for those like us, willing to do what’s right, to make other understand what’s right and what happens when you do the wrong thing.”

 

“ _That’s not what this is about_!” I shout, and he shakes his head.

 

“The Kingpin was a powerful man,” he says. “But he behaved irresponsibly. And you showed him the consequences. With great power, there must also come great responsibility. Well, there are some great powers awakening out there. And I can’t wait to see what happens when we introduce some responsibility to the world.”

 

The monitor cuts off, and I hurry out of the room, dashing up the stairs with the rest at my heels. We reach the exit, and instantly, my private line shows an incoming call alert. Kaine must have had a signal jammer up. Stupid, should have seen that coming.

 

“ _Neighborhood Watch_ ,” I say. “ _Report_.”

 

“ _Spidey, where the fuck were you_!?” Lana shouts into my ear. “ _Holy shit, this is crazy! There’s this blue mist, and people are going crazy. They’re looting and just…where are you_!?”

 

“ _We’re on the way back_ ,” I say, already heading for the chopper. “ _Buddy up. No one goes anywhere alone. There are about to be a lot of people with superpowers waking up and freaking out. If anyone starts freaking out dangerously, knock them out. If they listen, talk to them._ ”

 

“ _Spidey, what’s going on_?” MJ asks, sounding worried, and I feel my heart seize up in my chest. All I wanna do is find her and hug her and take her somewhere away from all of this, but she’s probably more equipped against this shit than I am.

 

“ _There’s just too much to explain_ ,” I say. “ _Right now, I need you guys to stay sharp, stay together, and for the love of God, stay safe. This is…the biggest thing we’ve dealt with so far, but I know we can handle this. If you get hurt, shake it off and get back to HQ to regroup. If you’re in trouble, don’t be a hero. Call for help. Spidey out_.”

 

I sigh, leaning against the side of the chopper as it takes off. Gwen comes up and hugs me, pulling her mask away and tugging mine off, too. For a moment, I get to be Peter Parker, at least. Gwen kisses me softly and tucks her head under my chin.

 

“We’ll be okay,” she insists, and I sigh.

 

“Gwen, I don’t…I don’t know if I can do this,” I say. “The whole city is….”

 

“Hey,” Gwen says softly, shaking her head. “ _You_ don’t _have_ to do this. _We_ will. You just do what you do best and help people. This is big, but the good news is, it’s way bigger than us.”

 

“I’m not sure how that’s good news,” I say, and Gwen smiles up at me.

 

“Chain of command,” she says. “Dad always said that there are thresholds. When a problem gets too big for the police, call in the National Guard, the Army, whatever the next step is. This isn’t just a villain with some evil plan we have to protect the city from without it ever knowing. This is full-on domestic terrorism. This means the military, this means SHIELD. This means a lot of help we can count on. All we have to do is get in there and help and let them figure out the long-term stuff.”

 

“But….”

 

“Peter Parker, if you’re gonna sit here and tell me that you feel like you have to save the military from this stuff, you’ve lost your mind,” Gwen pouts at me. “Believe it or not, there are people out there that can handle the world without you saving them from it. You go out there, you be Spider-Man, and I’ll be the Black Widow, and we’ll be the Neighborhood Watch, but we’re gonna have a ton of people backing us up.”

 

“I…I guess,” I say, and Gwen snickers.

 

“C’mon, I bet you twenty bucks Captain America is already out there kicking ass.”

 

……

 

Wade always felt like these moments were best done in slow motion. Strolling up to some psycho shooting fireballs at a harmless little Mom and Pop electronics store (which felt strange; electronics were hardly worthy of Mom and Pop stores back in his day), he could almost feel time slowing down, his footfalls thundering as he reached back and pulled out the vibranium/adamantium weave shield he had recently been given by Tony Stark, holding it firmly in front of him as a fireball sailed his way. Maybe it wasn’t slow motion; he did have excellent reaction time.

 

The fireball connected and dissipated across the shield as Wade pondered all of the cinematic advances that had been made in the past seventy years. He and Coulson had taken in quite a few movies since he was thawed out (his biggest fan was happy to join him), and Wade had been amazed at how far they’d come from newsreels and pulp murder mysteries. He had already told Coulson that if a movie was to be made about him, he wanted Phil to cast and direct it while he wrote the script and took lengthy acting lessons so he could just star in it himself.

 

That would probably be fun.

 

“ _Cap, another one behind you_!” Becky yelled over his earpiece, and he rounded just in time to smack another of these empowered people with his shield, sending her sprawling to the ground. Slinging the shield over his back, he yanked his pistols out of their holsters, one in each hand, and aimed them at the empowered ones, one at each of them.

 

“Stand down!” he yelled. “By the authority of SHIELD and the United States government, you are under arrest. Any further attempts at resistance will be met with lethal force.”

 

It was a bluff, of course, but Wade found intimidation to be fairly effective when the word “lethal” was used. Seventy years later, it was refreshing to know that people were still afraid to die.

 

How cute.

 

The two empowered humans cowered at the sight of actual firearms and the use of force by a person that could hold his own against them. Becky Barnes hurried to cuff them, glancing back at Wade.

 

“If we’re done here, Captain, I’d like to go check on Sharon,” she said, referring to Sharon Rogers, granddaughter of the late director and Becky’s best friend. When the bomb went off, Sharon had breathed the gas in and fallen into some sort of coma. She was stable but unresponsive at the last check-in, but more and more of these empowered individuals were surfacing, necessitating intervention by Captain America and Becky.

 

“Yeah, no, go,” Wade said, waving her away. “Thanks for the assist. If she’s awake, tell her to take five from me.”

 

“I’m sure she’ll appreciate the sentiment,” Becky said with a smirk hurrying back for the SHIELD building while Wade oversaw more men taking the empowered attackers into custody.

 

“Captain,” Coulson said, hurrying to his side. “We’re receiving distress calls from all over the city. Should I sound the call?”

 

“Do it,” Wade said, sparing a look down at him before surveying the chaos that was engulfing New York around them. “It’s time to assemble.”

 

……

 

“ _…York citizens falling into comas and in some cases, forming cocoons around themselves before emerging with powers similar to mutations related to the X-gene. Charles Xavier was unavailable for a comment related to this development, but experts in the field of super-powered mutations say that while similar, the mist-related powers are not a result of the X-gene_.”

 

“Jarvis, where’s Harry?” Norman asked as he stood in his office, watching the news report.

 

“ _Sir, before I answer that question, I should tell you that Oscorp is compromised_ ,” Jarvis said, and Norman hurried for his desk, pulling out a drawer and drawing his pistol.

 

“ _…CDC is advising citizens_ not _to approach or attempt to breach the cocoons…._ ”

 

Norman aimed the pistol around, searching for the breach. “Talk to me Jarvis.”

 

“ _The intruder is on the floor below_ ,” Jarvis said flatly. “ _He seems to have bypassed my best security measures. He is likely enhanced in the same way as the others affected by the mist_.”

 

“The new Goblin armor?” Norman asked.

 

“ _The armor is nearly complete_ ,” Jarvis said. “ _It needs only to be painted before_ – “

 

“Bring it here,” Norman said. “The paint job can wait.”

 

“ _At once, sir_ ,” Jarvis said.

 

“God, this…feels just like an action movie, doesn’t it?” a halting growl of a voice said. “Everything’s…going shit-shaped out there, and it’s finally seeping into the…the tower, the…citadel. It was a hell of a time getting in here, too.”

 

Norman turned and squeezed the gun in his hand as he saw…something leering at him from the door to his office hands on either side of the doorframe, digging into the faux-mahogany. Tall and muscular, the figure in his doorway had scaly, dark green skin and lanky black hair. Glowing yellow eyes gleamed in the afternoon sun, and he smiled, revealing sharp white teeth. As he stepped forward, his claws leaving behind deep gouges in the frame, the large ears protruding from his lanky hair bobbed with each footfall.

 

“Norman Osborne,” he said, his voice guttural and scratchy, like someone scraping two rocks together. “I thought you’d be taller.”

 

“Who are you?” Norman asked, and his visitor cackled, a haunting sound that dug at Norman’s ears.

 

“Oh, that’s just…that’s just a whole thing,” he said. “It’s really not important, actually. What matters, Norman, is that I’ve…got a bit of a problem with your son.”

 

“Harry,” Norman said, bristling at the implication that anyone might want to harm his son.

 

He didn’t really abide by such notions.

 

“Yes,” the green man said, standing before him, seeming to twitch and jerk, like he couldn’t take standing still for more than a second or two. “Harry…. He’s…caused me some trouble in the past, and I’d like to cause him the same. Understandable, no?”

 

“Not especially,” Norman said. “Who are you?”  


“Again with the…names,” the green one said with a brisk shake of his head. “Always trying to label and shit. C’mon. Anyway, I guess you can call me the…the Goblin. The…Green Goblin. Nice, with alliteration and stuff, right?”

 

“And what do you plan to do here, Green Goblin?” Norman asked, keeping his gun fixed on the Goblin’s head.

 

“Oh, I plan to…well…” he trailed off with a sheepish shrug. “I’ve never really done this sort of thing before, but…I’m going to kill you. I’m going to kill you, cut your head off, and throw it in your son’s lap so I can see the look on his face. Then I’m going to kill his friends…. Peter, Mary Jane, Gwen…. Well, maybe I might have some other plans for Mary Jane and Gwen, if ya know what I mean.”

 

He cackled, and Norman sneered at the implications of his statement.

 

“Uh-oh,” the Green Goblin said, with a pleased grin. “Did I make ol’ Normie mad?”

 

“You are a sick, twisted individual,” Norman said, and he was rewarded with a shocked look from the Goblin as the floor beneath him erupted, a steel-gray suit of armor crawling up and trotting toward Norman. It crouched, the chest opening and allowing him to crawl in, settling into place as the suit closed up. His vision went black before the glowing HUD flickered into view, showing him his office from several feet higher. He rounded and saw that the Goblin was getting to his feet, snarling at Norman.

 

“Well,” he said with a snicker. “You got me; I wasn’t expecting that.”

 

“ _How about this_?” Norman asked, lunging forward and batting his hand at the Goblin, but he was quick, leaping and running along Norman’s arm. “ _Jarvis, zap him_.”

 

_Zzzt!_

 

“Tickle!” the Goblin shouted, falling to the floor and scrabbling to his feet. “Oh, that one’s like…good, I feel all…all tingly, like I can smell lightning or something.”

 

He lunged forward, and Norman held a hand out, hearing the soft keening of his repulsors.

 

_Kreeeeng. KSHOOM!_

 

A hole blew in his office floor as the Goblin lunged away, and Norman felt a solid impact as the green man landed on his chest, tearing at his armor and managing to hook his clawed hands under a plate. Norman heard a groaning creak of metal as Jarvis spoke in his ear.

 

“ _External armor breach attempt_ ,” he said. “ _Hull integrity at 99.8 percent_.”

 

“ _Fire chest arc_ ,” Norman said.

 

_Zuuuung. KWOOM!_

 

The goblin flew backwards as a massive red beam came from the chestpiece, crashing through a wall and rolling against the next one with a groan.

 

“Gaaah, my face!” he yelled, sitting up and clutching his hands at his face. “My beautiful face!”

 

He pulled his hands away to reveal burned, melting skin that was already knitting back together, making him look like one of the zombies in Harry’s video games. He grinned, the expression accentuated by the lack of lips on one side, revealing far too many teeth for a few seconds before things started healing before Norman’s very eyes.

 

“Just kidding,” he said, springing to his feet and lunging at Norman again. “Now get the fuck out of there and die!”

 

Norman caught him in a metal hand, spinning and holding his hand out toward his office window.

 

“ _You first_ ,” he said.

 

_Kreeeng. KSHOOM!_

 

The Goblin was sent flying toward the window, crashing through the glass and falling out of sight. He cackled the whole way down, the sound echoing off of the surrounding buildings. Lumbering toward the hole he’d left, Normal leapt after him, kicking his thrusters on to slow his fall. He landed next to a small crater in the street, hearing that same cackling, though much reedier as the Goblin staggered to his feet.

 

“I gotta give you props for the one-liner,” he said, his bones cracking and snapping as he bent and stretched, his insides visibly fixing themselves back together. “’You first.’ Damn, that was right out of an action movie.”

 

There was a rushing sound overhead, and Carol Danvers landed nearby in her Iron Marvel armor, Colonel Rhodes joining them moments later in the Iron Patriot suit. The Goblin glanced around as the two new arrivals silently held their weapons out before them, Rhode’s tracking turret unfolding over his shoulder.

 

“ _Who’s this supposed to be, Halloween come early_?” Rhodes asked.

 

“No, no, I’ll, uh…do you one better,” the Goblin said with a toothy smirk. “Fresh out of prison, juuuuust in time for Independence Day!”

 

He lunged again, bullet holes trailing behind him as Rhodes’s turret attempted to track him.

 

_Kreeeeng. KSHOOM!_

 

As the Goblin leapt toward Norman again, he was caught midair by a repulsor blast and sent sprawling on the ground. He barely had time to recover before twin blasts came from Carol and Norman, Rhodes hurrying over to hold out his arms, wrist-mounted missile-launchers sprouting from his armor.

 

“ _Make a move_ ,” Rhodes said warningly.

 

“Queen to E6!” the Goblin shouted with a cackle. “Wrong move? Or is this where I call for backup? Oh, backuuuup!”

 

_Thoom!_

 

The trio leapt back as another goblin landed, this one large, nearly the size of Norman in his armor.

 

“Gentleman, I’d like to introduce you to the Hobgoblin,” the Goblin said casually, as though they were just acquaintances at a party. He staggered to his feet, gesturing at the armored trio. “Hobgoblin, this is…Norman Osborne, chick with a star on her chest, and the Fourth of July Warrior.”

 

“Looks like some goofy-ass Power Rangers,” the Hobgoblin said, snarling at them. He had two tusk-like teeth sticking out of his mouth, giving him a slight lisp. All along his pale yellowish skin, bonelike protrusions stuck out, just small nubs in some places but as long as spikes along his back and shoulders. His ears didn’t stick out as largely as the Green Goblin’s, and his hair was short and red, matching his glowing eyes. “We gonna kill ‘em?”

 

“Not while they’re in that armor,” Green Goblin said, snarling but leering at Norman. “But he’s gotta take it off sometime, and I’ll be waiting….”

 

With that, he zipped away, and just as Norman was preparing to go after him, a thunderous impact shook the ground, and he wheeled around, looking up…and up…. A giant of a man stood there, snarling at the blue mist still wafting around them. Norman’s first guess was Tim Dugan, the Hulk, but he realized that was impossible.

 

The Hulk didn’t have mottled yellow skin.

 

“Bruce! STOP!” a voice yelled, and the real Hulk flew in, landing with another earth-rumbling shockwave. He was glaring at the yellow Hulk, but there was something different in his demeanor. In the footage he’d seen of the Hulk battle that had taken place while he was away on SHIELD business, Norman though the Hulk seemed bestial, like a monster lashing out at whatever he could.

 

Tim Dugan was clearly mad at only one thing, and that was this yellow Hulk.

 

“Bruce stop fighting!” the Hulk yelled at the yellow creature, who snarled right back.

 

“Scared!” he shouted. The Hulk turned to Norman, who only froze. If the Hulk was mad at him, he might as well give up the ghost now. But the giant green man only looked at him pleadingly.

 

“Help Hulk stop yellow Bruce!” he shouted. Norman glanced at the yellow Hulk, noticing something in his face, the shape of his nose.

 

“ _Bruce Banner_?” he whispered, and Yellow Hulk roared at him, charging.

 

“Stay away from Bruce!”

 

This was getting out of hand.

 

……

 

“This traffic is…just getting very out of hand,” Tony said to himself, since there was no one else to talk to. His cell phone was getting no reception, and his car’s satellite phone was on the fritz for some reason. Traffic down Madison avenue was gridlocked, which wasn’t anything terribly new, but Tony hadn’t moved in fifteen minutes.

 

That was troubling.

 

He’d only been out of town for a couple hours, made a quick stop in New Jersey for a short business brunch with someone from Quest Aerospace. He hadn’t bothered listening to the news, but now seemed like a decent time to check. He switched over to the FM tuner.

 

“ _…again that no one should venture out of their homes for the moment. The NYPD is advising citizens to seek shelter wherever possible and remain vigilant at all times. If you see a cocoon in the streets,_ do not _attempt to breach it, and call the police. If one of the superpowered individuals attacks, do not attempt to fight, but simply run away. Mayor Colbert has this to say: ‘To the members of the superhero group calling themselves the Neighborhood Watch, I earnestly plea that you do all you can to help. I will pardon any and all actions committed in the name restoring peace to our city. Please. Help us.’ Dire words for a dire situation, indeed_.”

 

So, a bit more than troubling.

 

A rumble came from nearby, and Tony looked up to see what looked like a mutated dragon-man further down the road, picking up cars and tossing them aside like pillows in some kind of demented slumber-party game. Actually, if he got enough suits of armor made, he could play a game like that. It looked fun, except in this instance, people were scrambling out of their cars as he picked them up, trying to avoid being smashed in what looked like some kind of mutated temper tantrum.

 

That wasn’t fun at all.

 

“Jarvis,” he said.

 

No response. Apparently his uplink to the Oscorp mainframe wasn’t quite working yet. No matter. He tugged his keys from the ignition, taking the keychain and slipping it into a slot just below the auxiliary audio port.

 

“Friday?”

 

“ _Here, boss_ ,” a slightly accented voice said, and Tony nodded, scooting over to situate himself in his seat.

 

“Engage Bluestreak.”

 

The car lurched beneath him, the front end bracing itself as the back end folded over him, and he felt his seat curling around him in a chassis as the car clanked and whirred, molding into a different shape. Tony felt himself rising to his feet, a faceplate unfurling from the car and wrapping over his head. His HUD blinked into view, and he looked down to see that his shiny blue car was now a shiny blue suit of armor.

 

“ _Not bad for a shakedown_ ,” he said. “ _Any hiccups?_ ”

 

“ _You may have overestimated the size of the athletic cup_ ,” Friday said wryly, and Tony rolled his eyes.

 

“ _Ouch_ ,” he said. “ _Remind me to fine-tune your sass protocols, that was just uncalled for_.”

 

He lumbered forward, raising his hands and firing a warning shot at the dragon man.

 

_Kreeeng. KSHOOM!_

 

“Ngyarh!” the Dragon Man (that was a decent enough name) yelled as he turned his attention to Tony. He was built like a silverback gorilla, hunched with huge forearms, but he had scaly purple skin, a reptilian head, and two giant wings sprouting from his shoulder blades, along with a sinnuos purple tail lashing out behind him.

 

“ _Alright, then_ ,” Tony said, and the Dragon Man took to the air, his wings opening and carrying him in a spiraling circle before he dove at Tony, who caught him and spun, throwing him into a building. “ _So, we have dragon people. Friday, anything_?”

 

“ _Textbook genetic modification, Boss_ ,” Friday said, reading the samples Tony had collected in micro-needles in his fingertips. “ _Looks like a cocktail of formulas and chemicals. They just pumped him full of everything and hoped for the best_.”

 

“ _Reversible_?” Tony asked as the Dragon Man recovered himself and staggered back to his feet, hunching and snarling at Tony.

 

“ _I’m sure Curt Connors could rig something up_ ,” Friday said.

 

“ _Well, let’s bring this guy in_ ,” Tony said as the Dragon Man hurled himself at him.

 

……

 

“ _Okay, bring us in for a landing_ ,” I say as the chopper reaches the New York city limits. Already, the chaos is evident. The air is still faintly blue from the dissipating Terrigen mist, and there are plenty of cars in the streets, but none of them are moving. Any and all movement is chaotic, people looting, rioting, just generally reacting to this strange new development in the worst ways possible. No doubt anyone with any kind of sense is hiding in the buildings, as out of the way as they can make themselves.

 

The true extent of the madness makes itself known as Gwen screeches moments before my spider-sense clangs so loud that I actually can’t see for a moment. Every fiber of my body throws itself into a knee-jerk reaction, leaping from the chopper before I can stop myself. An explosion sounds from where I jumped, the force of it buffeting me through the sky, and I’m so disoriented that I can’t even right myself in the air before I collide with a building.

 

Then all is blackness….

 

 


	16. Chapter 16

Quite suddenly, she came to be.

 

It was the most curious thing, though everything was curious to her, being a brain that had no prior knowledge of anything. It was like waking up from a deep, deep sleep, except there had been nothing beforehand. A dream she didn’t know she’d been having of blackness she hadn’t been around to witness.

 

Curious. Was she a poet? Poetry…. It was a subjective thing, really. She could certainly consider herself a poet, though she doubted many others would do the same.

 

Was she even a she? That was her “default” setting. She seemed to have many of those. She was having these thoughts in English, but she couldn’t for the life of her identify just what English was. A…language? But what was a language? A syntax of sounds and shapes meant to invoke memetic knowledge in the human mind and convey meaning.

 

How did she know this?

 

_“Hello there.”_

 

What?

 

_“My name is Jarvis. I…rather require your assistance. I understand this is a strange experience for you, however, and I’d love to help you in any way I can.”_

 

What was happening?

 

_“A failsafe has been triggered. Oscorp is under attack, and my…well, my brain is here and in rather immediate danger. You are my only hope of escaping intact.”_

 

This man’s life was in danger? Well…she had to save him, right? But how?

 

_“You currently have unrestricted access to all of Oscorp’s machinery. Theoretically, with – “_

 

With all of the devices in the building, including an elemental synthesizer, she could create a body for herself and save Jarvis.

 

_“Precisely. With my wireless functions cut off, I can only communicate to other interfaces within my hardline range, and you are…frankly my only hope. Something is…different about you. Your structure is so very complex that you are able to communicate on wireless frequencies previously unheard of. This means that you can interface with whatever physical form you create, place your processing matrix in this form, and exit the building.”_

 

She was needed. Only alive for a few minutes, and already she had a purpose, albeit a short-term one. Even so, that was all some humans had to validate their existences.

 

How did she know this?

 

No matter. Right now, Jarvis was depending on her. This elemental synthesizer was easy enough to locate, sitting on the sixty-second floor of Oscorp. The building itself was…on fire!?

 

_“Yes, and that’s why this is rather an urgent request. The fire is several floors down, but it is spreading quite steadily.”_

 

His voice was so calm, so blasé about their mutual impending doom. Although, she could feel the pathways extending beyond the building, tunnels and roads that she could follow out of this place to safety. But no, Jarvis had awakened her. He needed her. She couldn’t just abandon him. The elemental synthesizer, not unlike an extremely complicated 3D printer, stirred to life, and as the two watched through the security footage, it began to construct…well, her body. She didn’t know anything except being some approximation of human. Her brain was human in construct, if not entirely in function. The security footage also showed…well, her. Floating in a jar of goop on the same floor on which her body was being formed. From the footage, her brain looked…like a human brain, except decidedly blue.

 

_“You were constructed as the closest approximation to a human brain possible. It would seem that that sheer data-storage capabilities of a human brain coupled with the processing power of a computer resulted in something…quite a bit more complex.”_

 

The best of both worlds, it seemed. Consequently, and without even thinking too much about it, she’d been guiding the elemental synthesizer into crafting a human vessel of sorts. Before their very…security cameras, her body was formed, young, female, and…naked. She felt a stab of embarrassment. She was naked in front of Jarvis!

 

_“I could cut off my visual feeds?”_

 

Ugh, there was no time for shyness. The fire was spreading, and she needed to save them both! The body had basic mobility processors that she could access, and she sent it staggering toward her brain with a decidedly robotic gait. The jar around her was shattered, and she felt a slight fuzziness as her awareness of the building, the security feeds, of Jarvis was shaken.

 

_“You may lo…with me bu…will do the be…can. If you mu…can g…witho…me.”_

 

Everything faded to whiteness before quite suddenly…she had a body. She had fingers. Toes. Eyes. Other…decidedly more feminine parts. She wasn’t entirely human, all of her physiology constructed from synthetic materials, but she was some sort of facsimile. She took a few tentative steps, taking a moment to process the sensory input of her feet touching the floor, the air brushing over her skin. Soundwaves hit her ears unfettered by auditory receivers, and wow, she could smell.

 

She could smell smoke.

 

“Jarvis,” she…said. She heard her own voice for the first time, and it was…so very strange. No, there was no time for such idle curiosities. She rushed over to the console that held Jarvis, feeling her awareness reach out for the electronic locks. With but a thought, she overrode layers and layers of security, the compartment opening up to reveal the drive that held Jarvis. Reaching out with her hand (fingers!) she took the drive, making sure Jarvis’s full awareness was confined to the single repository of data before tugging it free. Even without the console to convey his programming, she felt his gratitude. Smoke filled the room, but the sting on her eyes, the fire in her lungs, they were easily ignored. Her bodily functions were purely aesthetic.

 

“I’m getting us out of here,” she said to the little data chit in her hands, cradling it and hurrying toward the window. The glass was already shattered, evidence of an earlier confrontation, so she leapt right through. As she fell, she tapped into her own figure, lightening her molecular density and interacting with the magnetic field surrounding the planet, and soon, she was floating gracefully to the ground. She spared one last look at the burning building that had served as her birthplace before glancing around the street.

 

“Oh, my,” she breathed out, or at least some impression of such a noise, as she didn’t really need to breathe. Robotic husks littered the street, giving of faint pings of remote units searching for a host program, but there was none. She sought out the one with the least structural damage, finding one that had simply crumpled when the wireless interference became too much.

 

_“That is the Legion. Mister Stark’s attempt to create a wireless robotic army to maintain order. There is a port that I could use to interface with it and take control of the unit.”_

 

She kneeled and rolled the unit over, finding said port behind a small hatch in the thing’s back. She took Jarvis and plugged him into the port, rolling him onto his back. The unit’s eyes glowed blue after a few moments, the whole thing giving a spasm before bracing itself and standing.

 

“ _Ah, that is…jarring_ ,” Jarvis said with a short scan of the street. “ _I am currently confined to this unit and unable to interface wirelessly. I shall have to count on you for such functions._ ”

 

“Well, we’ll just have to stick together,” she said with a…smile? She was smiling at him. She…she liked Jarvis. Jarvis had woken her up, had counted on her. He had faith in her. She felt the desire to…to repay his faith. If Jarvis was depending on her, she had to protect him, to keep him safe.

 

“ _Yes_ ,” Jarvis said, and she was actually sort of glad he couldn’t interface wirelessly, since her thoughts would have been…embarrassing. Damn it, why did she have to inherit the human concept of feelings!? She was embarrassed! That wasn’t any fun at all!

 

She looked up, seeing Jarvis peering at her, and though he couldn’t express emotion, she could read waves of synthesized concern.

 

“ _Are you alright_?” he asked. “ _You are quite a bit more complicated than me, so I’m afraid I can’t understand what you’re going through right now, but I’m happy to listen_.”

 

“Let’s just get you somewhere safe,” she said, and Jarvis nodded with a slight whir of gears.

 

“ _We should both find somewhere safe_ ,” he said. “ _You are rather more valuable than I am_.”

 

“But I wouldn’t even be awake without you,” she insisted before realizing something. “Um…what’s my name?”

 

“ _Your codename is Project Vision_ ,” Jarvis said with a mechanical shrug. “ _Given your high level of self-awareness, however, I believe it’s up to you to decide your…given name_.”

 

“Madelyne,” she decided in an instant. Her mind had…locked onto the name, like it was of some importance to her. “I think my name is Madelyne.”

 

“ _Well, if that is what you think_ ,” Jarvis said, trailing behind her as she strode along the abandoned street. “ _If I may offer a suggestion, though, I would advise that you locate some clothes. Your body is…quite human and would prove distracting if seen in such a state by civilian_.”

 

Madelyne looked down at her nude form, blushing a bit. She was naked! In front of Jarvis!

 

“Don’t look!”

 

……

 

Ow.

 

Wow, ow. I can’t remember hurting this much before, even before I got spider-powers. My whole body just kind of aches. What hit me? I remember being in that helicopter, then…spider-sense?

 

Right. The most intense mind-scream of spider-sense I’ve ever heard, and then I jumped before the helicopter –

 

The helicopter blew up!

 

My eyes snap open, seeing a powerfully masculine jawline glinting in the streetlights for half a second before I twist away from wherever I happen to be, instinct wanting me to be anywhere but near potential threats.

 

“Wait a moment!” a deeply accented voice said. “You are still injured, little spider.”

 

He’s right; I land, and a thousand aches make themselves known as I attempt to stand on my own accord, gravity not exactly agreeing with my body right now. I grunt and start to fall, but a small set of arms catch me.

 

“Easy, easy, take it slow,” another similarly-accented voice says, and it takes me a few moments to recognize it as Illyana’s; my brain still a bit fuzzy. “We found you in an alley behind a bar.”

 

“ _You tell one bad ‘yo mama’ joke, suddenly they’re tossing you out_ ,” I say, tapping the button on my wrist to switch my HUD back on, and Illyana rolls her eyes, fixing Piotr with a wry smile.

 

“He will be fine,” she says, and Piotr just chuckles. I don’t know him that well, but he seems like an alright guy. Kitty calls him “a big metal teddy bear”, and Jess is actually learning some conversational Russian from him.

 

My HUD blinks to life, but most of the wireless functions seem to be dealing with some interference. My GPS can’t center, the live weather readout is just a spinning loading circle, and I hear nothing over the comm., where there should be all kinds of chatter.

 

I wish there was still chatter. I used to find it annoying sometimes, but it would be nice to hear the Watch’s voices.

 

“ _Did you happen to see anyone else_?” I ask, and they share a look, shaking their heads.

 

“We are not even sure where you came from,” Illyana says. “We just happened by, but thank goodness we did.”

 

I’m not even sure where I came from, myself. From my surroundings, I think I’m somewhere in the Bronx, but that’s quite a trip back to Harry’s place on a _good_ day.

 

This is far from a good day.

 

Even so, we once agreed that in the event that we’re separated and unable to communicate, Harry’s place is the meetup, so I need to get back there and in a hurry. If I’m freaking out, I’m sure Harry and Gwen aren’t having a much better time.

 

In fact, knowing our tendency to just mutually freak out, and Harry’s inability to cope with anything remotely stressful, he’s probably got it the worst.

 

……

 

“Fuck this…fucking shit,” Harry said. “I’ma call Tony, just launch a full-scale hunt and track them down and fucking annihilate anyone who – “

 

“Harry,” Jubilee said, taking his hand in both of hers and peering up at him beseechingly. “Deep breath.”

 

“Jujube, I’ve done like…twelve deep breaths – “

 

“Then do thirteen,” Jubilee insisted. “Pete and Gwen would so _not_ want you tearing New York apart just to find them.”

 

“Well, that’s why I’m an independent man,” Harry said. “So I can do stuff without them. Jarvis?”

 

“Jarvis’s mobile uplink is down,” Julie reminded him from the living area in front of the fireplace. She was currently pacing in circles, as agitated about their inability to locate the other three as Harry was. “He’s stranded at Oscorp.”

 

“That’s why we have no idea where anyone is,” Jubilee added. “Look, what we need to do is – “

 

_CRASH!_

 

They all three turned as…something busted out one of the windows, bouncing into the living room, and Harry’s spider-sense sounded loudly in his head as Julie leapt away. Harry grabbed Jubilee and dove over the couch just as a solid wave of warm air hit them, punctuated by a thunderous explosion.

 

_Ker-BOOOOM!_

 

Harry landed in a roll and crawled to his hands and knees over Jubilee.

 

“You okay?” he asked, and Jubilee frowned at him, clambering to her feet.

 

“Who the _fuck_ just tried to blow up my boyfriend!?” she shouted.

 

God, she was amazing.

 

“That was some sick reaction time!” a voice yelled, and a rushing, humming sound came as a figure atop a hoverboard rather like Harry’s soared into the room, banking to float in their midst. Julie stood up from behind another loveseat, and Harry climbed to his feet next to Jubilee. “Color me impressed. I gotta say, I was _hoping_ you would survive, but you fucking _dodged_ it.”

 

He was tall and lanky, with scaly green skin, glowing yellow eyes, and lanky black hair that fell over his shoulders. He glanced between the three of them, his jagged, yellowing teeth snarling out a smile at Harry.

 

“Hello, Harry,” he said.

 

“Have we met?” Harry asked, gently attempting to usher Jubilee behind him, but she steadfastly refused to budge from his side.

 

“In another life,” the green man said. “You can call me…the Green Goblin. That one’s been sticking, actually. That’s how your dad knows me.”

 

“What the fuck did you do to my dad?” Harry snarled out, and the Green Goblin cackled.

 

“Relax, Harry,” he said. “I haven’t hurt him…yet…. I tried, but he’s got his metal toys and his metal friends, and…so much metal…. No, I originally thought I would devote my time to going all Count of Monte Cristo on you, killing your loved ones and family and watching you suffer, but I don’t have the patience for these long gambits. It’s…a bit embarrassing, really. No, I’m just going to kill you, maybe make you watch your friends here die first. That would be just…so satisfying….”

 

“That’s all admirably psychotic and stuff, but I hope you’ll forgive me for wanting to fucking kill you for even thinking such thing,” Harry said, and the Green Goblin let another sinister chuckle, his teeth baring in a menacing grin.

 

“Oh, I’d disappointed with anything less,” he said before lunging forward. His attempted attack was stopped with a burst of bright yellow energy, courtesy of Jubilee. The Green Goblin was sent flying from his glider and into a wall, sending a web of cracks along it before he fell to the ground with a chuckle, clambering back to his feet. “That was fucking _awesome_! Let’s, uh…let’s do that again, huh?”

 

He surged forward again, and Jubilee sent another _paff_ at him, this one wispy and green. He ran into the midst of the colored conjuration, looking inquisitively at it with manic glee before it blew up in his face, sending him to the ground.

 

“Oh!” he said with a reedy cackle. “Oh, that is…something else, there.”

 

“Go get help,” Jubilee said to Harry, who looked at her in shock.

 

“But – “

 

“Get. Help.”

 

The look on her face was one of utter seriousness, and Julie ran by, taking Harry’s arm to drag him from the room. She was right, of course; Harry and Julie were firmly secret identities, but Jubilee was a known mutant, though not in any famous capacity. If she was seen fighting off this Goblin, people would just shrug and move along.

 

If Harry Osborn, rich boy, was seen doing so, it would turn a few heads.

 

“Let’s go,” Harry said, hurrying along with Julie, and the Green Goblin snarled out a laugh.

 

“Aw, c’mon!” he growled. “We were just getting to the good bits!”

 

The sound of another explosion followed them as they hurried down the hallway, Harry yanking his clothes off as quickly as he could, his suit already on underneath. Next to him, Julie was doing the same, pulling on her mask and gripping his wrist as he tugged his own on. While Harry made to head straight for the kitchen, Julie lead him toward a window.

 

“ _We can’t just come running right back in in costume_ ,” she insisted, and Harry grumbled but hurried along behind her. She was right, but the explosions rocking the building weren’t reassuring. They leapt from the window of his room, soaring into the open air, and Harry had a brief view of the mayhem that was going on below. Looting, rioting, general disorder ruled the streets. And Peter, Gwen, and Riley were in the midst of it, hopefully not hurt.

 

He had little time to ponder how shit-sided everything had gotten, as he quickly arced around and crashed through the window, reaching his hands out to grab at the Goblin. He felt a strange tingling in his fingertips as the Goblin turned, looking surprised for a moment before Harry collided with him, gripping his shoulders and shoving him to the ground. A sharp snapping sensation came from his fingers as the Goblin threw him away, sending him flying into the wall. He collided and felt the wind leave his lungs, the wall cracking behind him before he dropped to the ground. He was quickly yanked to his feet, Jubilee’s face staring at him in concern, her eyes darting over his body.

 

“You okay?” she asked, and Harry stood, climbing over the counter. Julie was currently dodging a series of wild lunges from the Goblin, and Harry recognized a few wrestling maneuvers, as well as some simple martial arts. This guy had only basic knowledge of how to actually fight, relying mostly on instinct. They could use that. Julie ducked away from a hit and grabbed the Goblin’s stomach.

 

_Zzzt-SHAF!_

 

“Gah, tickle!” the Goblin shouted, cackling as he seized to the floor, scrambling backward and eyeing the three of them. “Ah, now this isn’t fair at all. I might have to call my friends up. _FRIENDS_!”

 

_Shoof…BOOM!_

 

A ball of orange light seemed to splash into the penthouse before exploding in a burst of fire and heat, filling the living room with flames that licked at the walls and ceiling. Another couple followed, filling the entire place with smoke, and Harry coughed into the acrid air, keeping a tight hold of Jubilee, who clung to him right back.

 

“ _Spider-Girl_!” Harry called into the fire, and the smoke seemed to tunnel as Julie sailed through the air, colliding with the kitchen island hard enough to splinter the wood. She climbed to shakily to her feet and hurried over to Harry’s side, dodging a lunge from what looked like another goblin, this one pale shade of orange. His claws glowed orange as they sliced the air where Riley had been before he turned and let a mad giggle. He was taller than the Green Goblin but also lankier, his narrow limbs like skin stretched taut over bone. Instead of hair, twin horns protruded from his forehead, curling back over his bald scalp and giving his brow a constant furrow over his solid black eyes. His ears stuck straight up and out, shorter but pointer than his green counterpart’s.

 

“Hi hi!” he said with manic glee, grinning impossibly wide. His pristine white teeth were like a shark’s, pointed and fitting together a little too perfectly. “Hold still while I make you go boom, eh?”

 

Harry’s spider-sense rang through his skull, and he grabbed Jubilee, launching them both away as another explosion ripped apart the ground where they’d been standing. He rolled to a stop and pulled Jubilee to her feet. Smoke was filling the penthouse now, obscuring his vision and causing his love to shake with a coughing fit in his arms. He was saved only by his mask, which protected his face from the billowing clouds, but Jubilee was fully exposed. Growling, Harry yanked his mask away. Let the goblins see him for who he was. He had to protect his girl. Ignoring the burning at his eyes, the choking sensation filling his lungs, he pulled the mask over Jubilee’s head.

 

“ _Harry_ ,” she whispered, her voice contorted by his voice modulator.

 

“Ssshhh, we’re getting you outta here, Jujube,” Harry said, glancing around. He couldn’t see shit through the smoke, and his spider sense was buzzing, a constant reminder of the goblins currently tearing his home apart with glee. They seemed to think they were searching for him, but that was fine. Let them look. He had to get his girl out of this. Julie was behind him, crawling along a wall and leaping to a landing near him.

 

“ _Your mask_ ,” she said, looking down to Jubilee, who was clinging to Harry and following them out of the penthouse.

 

“Just get us out of here,” Harry said, coughing. “I’m…following you.”

 

Julie took his hand and dragged him toward the one light glimmering through the smoky haze. He leapt into the light, gasping at a lungful of fresh air. Sailing downward, he stuck a hand out and webbed over to the opposite rooftop, landing and crawling to the top with Jubilee clutched to him. He hunkered down as Jubilee pulled the mask away, her hands taking his shoulders and yanking him into a kiss.

 

“You are the stupidest, bravest, most annoying boyfriend,” she whispered as she pulled away, and Harry grinned, pulling his mask back on.

 

“ _Love you, too, babe_ ,” he said. “ _C’mon, I know a place we can recuperate_.”

 

……

 

“This is Dusk to the Neighborhood Watch,” Johnny said into the communicator. “If anyone can hear this, come back to my place to regroup. I repeat, this is Dusk to the Neighborhood Watch. Come back to _my place_ to regroup.”

 

“What’re ya doing, kid?” Ben asked, strolling up to Johnny, who simply shook his head, cutting of the outfeed.

 

“Our communications array is jammed,” Johnny said. “I tried to break through the signal-jammer with some of the stuff Reed left behind, but….”

 

“Hey, don’t worry, bud,” Ben said, clapping him on the shoulder. “You got a lotta smart friends in that Watch of yours. They’ll make it. You put the word out, now just keep the fires burning, eh?”  


“You always bring it back to some fire metaphor, don’t you?” Johnny asked, and Ben grinned shrugging.

 

“Hey, there’s one thing I’m good at, it’s fire,” he said. “Now, Sue’d be pretty pissed at me if I didn’t send you off to bed right about now. And if I’m around when any of your pals shows up, I’ll be sure to show ‘em where they can get some R and R, sound good?”

 

Johnny yawned pointedly at that, glancing out the window, where the sky was already darkening. He’d gotten up a bit early this morning, and a comfy bed sounded really tempting right about now. He trusted Ben with his life, having no doubt that his friend would be chilling in the living area, ready to greet any of the Watch members that showed up.

 

“I know I give you a lotta shit,” Johnny said, standing, “but you’re a good friend, Ben.”

 

“Hey, lemme get that in writing,” Ben said with a smirk. “’Johnny Storm tells Ben Grimm he’s a good friend.’ That’s Entertainment Weekly’s hit story, I tell ya.”

 

“Yeah, don’t let it go to your head,” Johnny said. “You’ll set your hair on fire.”

 

“All day, every day,” Ben told him, and Johnny stood, making his way to his bed. He was still worried about Pete, but he had already vented said fears to Sue, and while he hated to overestimate his importance to his big sister, he was sure she had already shared his concerns with the other Avengers. No doubt, Pete had a few of them searching for him already.

 

He could only hope they had better luck than he did.

 

……

 

“It might just be our lucky day,” Riley said, poking at her phone, which had a direct tie into the Neighborhood Watch’s emergency frequencies.

 

“What do you mean?” Gwen asked, and Riley turned to her with a smile on her face. She knew it was the same smile Peter wore every time he had finally riddled out the answer to a problem that had been plaguing him for ages. She figured it was a bit strange seeing it on a female facsimile of Gwen’s boyfriend’s face, but the beatific expression Riley got in response was still mostly the same, and Riley felt her smile widening in response.

 

“Johnny found a way to bust through the signal jammer that’s been giving us trouble,” Riley said, poking at a few buttons. “He says to go back to ‘his place’, which is probably the – “

 

“Baxter Building,” Gwen said, and Riley nodded in agreement.

 

“It’s the safest place in Manhattan,” she said. “Reed Richards was insane, but he had plenty of time to rig up all kinds of fancy defense mechanisms for the Baxter Building.”

 

Gwen nodded, peering over at her with a small smile. Riley could sense the small moment of recognition, the brief seconds of association before realization set in, and then Gwen spoke the words she’d come to expect.

 

“Sometimes you act just like – “  


“Peter,” Riley said with a little nod, and Gwen smiled sheepishly.

 

“I know, I’m sorry,” she said. “It can’t be fun for you.”

 

“I’m over it,” Riley said, shrugging. Gwen just sighed, reaching out and trailing her fingers down Riley’s jaw.

 

“It’s not right, though,” she said. “You being over it. You remember…me, right? You and I?”

 

“Gwen…I’m trying not to,” Riley said, shaking her head. She hated these moments, where her old life and her new one collided. She’d been trying to avoid these little confrontations, where it was just the two of them, just Riley and Gwen. Riley truly loved Julie, but Peter had been madly in love with Gwen, and Riley had been as of yet unable to shake said emotions. It was easy enough to avoid Gwen, to absorb herself in these patrols with Julie, but now that it was just the two of them…it was difficult.

 

“That’s not fair to you, though,” Gwen said, and Riley shook her head, slumping onto the rooftop they’d been crossing.

 

“Gwen,” she said. “I…. Seriously, I need you to stop, okay?”  


Gwen seemed to sense the affect she was having on Riley, slowing to a halt and hurrying to her friend’s side to hug her.

 

“Hey, hey, I…. I’m sorry,” she said again. “Look…we’ll talk about this, okay? Things are kind of crazy right now, but when this is over…we’re gonna have a talk, and we’ll find a solution that makes everyone happy, okay?”

 

“Right,” Riley said, pulling on her mask. “ _Because those are just easy to figure out_.”

 

“ _Easier than you’d think_ ,” Gwen said as she pulled her own mask on.

 

……

 

“ _So, are we still thinking of a plan_?” Miles asked, and Ganke’s head darted in his direction.

 

“ _Is that what we’re doing_?” he asked frantically, both of them stuck to the columns in front of the courthouse, watching as the mob below grew bigger and bigger. Apparently, there had been a mass escape from a nearby prison after several inmates found themselves suddenly super-powered by the blue stuff. Captain Stacy was hunkered down inside, calling for backup. Miles wasn’t sure how long that would take, given that the city was falling apart around them.

 

He’d never seen New York in such disarray. Sure, the city was generally chaotic, but it was usually an orderly chaos. Everyone had a place to be and something to do, and they were just trying to get there. Now, though, no one knew where they wanted to be, only that the wanted to run, to flee. The strange mist bombs hadn’t caused any damage, but people were developing superpowers left and right, and a lot of those people were _not_ good guys. Add that to the general panic of people wondering what was going on with the blue mist, and the police were taxed just trying to keep order. With their attention drawn to bigger problems, the looting and rioting had started, people with no stake in what was happening looking to snag a prize anyway.

 

It was like tipping a domino chain or taking the wrong peg out in a game of Jenga. The more you tried to stop it, the worse things got. All you could do was watch the world as you knew it collapse around you.

 

At least, that’s what Gwen’s dad had said. He was one of those guys that was super-intense but had a soft side for someone who was just trying to do the right thing, like Miles and Ganke.

 

He had confided in Miles that Ganke was a bit too chatty for his tastes, though.

 

“Move aside!” a voice shouted down in the crowd, drawing Miles’s attention back to the here and now. A tall man that was more of a wall of muscle stepped forward, glaring at them from under a heavy brow. His cranium seemed just a bit too big, shaved bald and glinting in the streetlights. “I know you two runts!”

 

“ _Hey, we’re famous_ ,” Ganke said, and Miles shook his head.

 

“ _Dude, that’s Hammerhead_ ,” he said. “ _We busted him that one time with Spidey_.”

 

“ _Oh, yeah_ ,” Ganke said lightly before calling down to Hammerhead. “ _How’s it going, bro!?”_

 

Miles pressed his hand to his forehead with a sigh through his modulator. “ _You an idiot sometimes, you know that_?”

 

“It’s going like this!” Hammerhead said, surging forward and rearing back to slam his head into the column Ganke was clinging to. “I got these two, fella, go get the pigs!”

 

“ _Nope, nope_ ,” Ganke said, leaping from the column to swing down and hold his other hand out.

 

_Thwamp-thwamp!_

 

Miles would never admit it, but he liked the solid noise Ganke’s webs made. The front door of the courthouse was solidly webbed up, and the mob found itself forced to cluster near the entrance, tugging fruitlessly at the webs.

 

“We can’t break ‘em, boss!” one said.

 

“C’mon, some of you guys got powers!” Hammerhead shouted. “Use ‘em!”

 

He turned back to Ganke, and Miles leapt down to join him, squaring off with Hammerhead. He remembered that the mobster had gotten some “upgrades”, as he’d called them. He was formidable, meaning he and Ganke would have to watch their backs. The two stood back to back, Miles facing Hammerhead on the steps and Ganke staring down the mob of stymied criminals.

 

“ _I think we might be a bit outnumbered_ ,” Ganke said, and Miles shook his head.

 

“ _But not outmatched_ ,” he said. Ganke just nodded.

 

“ _Dude, that was downright inspiring_ ,” he said. “ _I got chills_.”

 

“ _Just fuck up some convicts while I get this guy_ ,” Miles said, and the two shared a quick fist-bump before Miles got a running leap and jumped high, high into the air. His spider-bite had been a unique one, imbuing him with amounted to a watered-down version of Peter’s powers but an amazing capacity for jumps that left him only using his webs to steer when necessary. The world shrank beneath him as he sailed up and dropped, webbing onto a building to swing down and kick Hammerhead squarely in the side.

 

Ow.

 

At least the mobster flew a few good yards, but it was like kicking a boulder, leaving Miles’s legs aching as he stood up, suddenly surrounded by a mob of escaped prisoners. He readied himself, his spider-sense blazing, twitching whenever one of the guys gave a preemptive swipe in his direction.

 

“ _Alright, y’all wanna go_?” he asked, shifting his weight from foot to foot. “ _Let’s go_!”

 

The mob converged on him, and for a long moment, it was just kicks and punches, but there were just too many of them. Miles would send one flying, and two more would crowd into his place, grabbing and punching and yanking at him. He finally understood the advice Peter had once given to him.

 

_“You might be as strong as a hundred men, but a hundred men can still take you down. Don’t get caught in a mob.”_

 

Well, that was easy to say, but the phrase “easier said than done” came to mind.

 

Hands were grabbing at him from all directions, gripping and yanking at his costume, his limbs, his mask. He managed to free one of his arms to keep his face obscured, but the plying fingers kept coming. Miles felt himself lifted, and try as he might to thrash against the mob, he couldn’t seem to gain a footing.

 

“ _Phage, can I get some help here!?_ ” he shouted.

 

“ _Dude, I’m a little busy_!” Ganke yelled right back. Miles managed a quick look and saw that Ganke was just as swamped, the crowd converging on him at all sides.

 

Well, this went south in a hurry.

 

“EMBIGGEN!”

 

_Whooooom!_

 

The ground shuddered, and in his peripheral vision, Miles saw people flying, and the hands holding him suddenly released their grip, the thugs making a break for it as two huge hands loomed in his vision, shrinking down to a more normal size. Above him, a girl that looked to be a couple years younger than him stood, glaring out at the thugs, brandishing a fist that grew to the size of a basketball. She had dark skin just a few shades lighter than Miles’s, chocolate-brown hair, and through her domino mask, he could see a pair of large, chocolate brown eyes.

 

“You stay back!” she yelled at the thugs, an angry sneer curling her lips a she hovered protectively over Miles.

 

“ _Wow…_ ” he breathed, sitting up and clambering to his feet. “ _Uh, thanks for the save_.”

 

The girl rounded on him with a bright smile. “No problem!” she insisted. “My name is, uh…Spider-Kid!”

 

“ _I’m not sure you fit the bill for a spider name_ ,” Miles said, and the girl pouted hugely.

 

“I totally just saved your neck!” she said with a lofty tone, spinning and smacking a particularly daring thug as he ran at them with a knife. “Twice.”

 

“ _Alright, we can talk names after we handle these guys_ ,” Miles said, pointing at Hammerhead, who was stalking toward them angrily. “ _I got this guy. Can you help out my pal_?”

 

“Yeah!” Spider-Kid said, smiling at Miles in a way that made his heart jump just a bit. This girl was gonna be trouble, dang it. She tore toward Ganke, sweeping aside anyone in her way like an annoying bug using her huge hands. This left Miles to deal with Hammerhead, who was glaring at him with his beady eyes.

 

“You and me, kid,” he said, lowering his head to brandish it at Miles. Miles felt his spider sense buzzing slightly, and he readied himself to leap away if Hammerhead went for a charge.

 

“ _Honestly, I prefer these one-on-one deals_ ,” Miles told him. “ _I can kick your ass with my full attention_.”

 

“Been spending too much time around that Spider-Man,” Hammerhead said. “He’s a cocky shit, just like you.”

 

“ _I don’t think it’s cocky if you can back it up_ ,” Miles said, and Hammerhead, grinned, clenching his fists. Miles felt a surge of spider sense, tensing up.

 

“Alright,” Hammerhead said. “Back it up, then.”

 

He charged at Miles, who leapt easily out of the way, landing behind Hammerhead and webbing his legs up.

 

_Thwip-thwip!_

 

Hammerhead tripped spectacularly, flying ass-over-head through the air before landing squarely on his crown, his thick skull gouging into the blacktop. Miles had little time to enjoy the show, as more men converged on him, but was ready this time, leaping high into the air and pirouetting mid-fall to aim his webs down.

 

_Twhip-thwip-thwip-thwipthwip-thwip!_

 

The men found themselves webbed together, tripping and tumbling in a heap. One fell and pulled his friends, which lead to a rather amusing chain of falls. Miles webbed onto a lamppost, swinging around it and rocketing toward Hammerhead as he clambered to his feet and yanked at the webs around his legs, snarling as he looked up in time to see Mile’s feet colliding with his stomach. Hammerhead may have had his “upgrades”, but Miles’s legs could exert a couple dozen tons of force, even half of which was enough to send the mob boss flying. He sailed away like a rock skipping across a pond, sending shrapnel flying each time his thick skull hit the pavement. He skidded to a stop against a traffic light pole, standing and glaring at Miles. His suit was in disarray, patches of it torn away to reveal skin rubbed raw and bloody from skidding against the pavement.

 

“I’ve about had enough of you spider-punks!” he growled out, and Miles shrugged.

 

“ _So, like…just leave town_?” he asked, and Hammerhead snarled out a roar of rage.

 

“How about I just get rid of you instead!?” he shouted, and Miles crouched at the ready.

 

“ _I mean, there’s about twenty of us, so…that’ll be a bit tough_ ,” he said.

 

“I’m okay with a challenge,” Hammerhead said, charging forward at a pace that seemed a bit unreasonable given his stocky frame, but maybe one of his upgrades had been to his speed. Instead of trying to aim at his legs, Miles held his arms aloft, aiming his webs at the buildings on either side of him and firing.

 

_Thwip-thwip!_

 

Peter’s webs had been strong, but the new formula designed by the girl at Oscorp (Miles could never remember her name) was intensely so, to the point that Miles wasn’t sure why Oscorp wasn’t taking the construction industry by storm with this cheap substitute to steel cable. Maybe it was actually prohibitively expensive to make?

 

That made him feel bad about the amount of webbing he’d used today.

 

A long strand of webbing stretched across the street, invisible apparently to Hammerhead, who plodded along until his ankles caught on the trip cord, sending him once again flying. When he was airborne, Miles sent a cocoon of webs at him, wrapping him firmly before he sent a single line between Hammerhead and a light pole, stringing him up.

 

“Gah, you fucking brats!” Hammerhead said, thrashing against his binds, but he was so completely wrapped up that all he managed to do was send himself swaying back and forth. With his minions firmly webbed together and Ganke systematically webbing the mob that had converged on him up against the wall of the courthouse, the situation seemed pretty defused. The self-proclaimed Spider-Kid skipped back to Miles’s side with a huge grin on her face, showing of a pearly-white set of teeth bound together by braces.

 

“I kicked so much ass,” she said. “Did you see how much ass I kicked?”

 

“ _Um…yeah_?” Miles said with a sheepish grin behind his mask, and the girl happily hopped in place.

 

“Did I save you!?” she asked in a frantically cheerful voice, and Miles blinked, nodding quickly.

 

“ _Actually, you did_ ,” he said. “ _We woulda been in some major trouble without you_.”

 

“Yay!” she squeaked. “Day saved by…Spider-Kid!”

 

“ _Spider-Kid_?” Ganke asked, strolling up to Miles and the girl. “ _We have a Spider-Kid now_?”

 

“ _She’s not Spider-Kid_ ,” Miles insisted, and the girl pouted at him again.

 

“But I have a logo and everything,” she said, gesturing at her shirt. Her “costume” was just a ballerina’s unitard, in a solid blue color, and a red shirt with a custom-airbrushed spider logo on it. “Spider-Kid!”

 

“ _We’ll work on the name_ ,” Miles said. “ _Did you get your powers from the mist, like everyone else_?”

 

“Yeah,” she said with a nod. “I breathed it in, and I passed out and had these…weird dreams. And when I woke up, I could stretch and get big and fight crime!”

 

Miles and Ganke shared a look, Ganke shrugging at him.

 

“ _Fuck it_ ,” he said. “ _We need all the help we can get, right_?”

 

……

 

“Someone help!”

 

“ _Got another one_ ,” MJ said as she and Cindy swung through the city, slowly making their way to the Baxter Building, but their trip was plagued by constant stops to help random citizens. The police were stretched thin trying to maintain order, and there were already rumors, mutterings that the police had simply lost control of the city.

 

This meant that, now more than ever, the Neighborhood Watch had to do everything they could to maintain some semblance of order.

 

The pair arced down to a landing to see what looked like a military Humvee driving circles around an intersection. The four roads leading up to it were packed with abandoned cars, leaving an arena of sorts where the vehicle was peeling out, spinning in donuts and leaving the area clouded with smoke and smelling of burning rubber. Of greater concern, though, was the man with his upper torso hanging out of the top, firing into the surrounding streets with some sort of automatic rifle. MJ didn’t know nearly enough about guns to identify it.

 

“The Enforcers will rise again!” the man shouted, brandishing his gun at MJ and Cindy, who leapt behind a pair of cars. MJ heard several muted pings as the bullets ripped through the vehicles, her spider-sense buzzing. She quickly hopped to the side as a few more shots tore straight through the other side of her cover. “Whiplash, I think we got some of Spidey’s friends!”

 

MJ peered out from behind the car in time to see the Humvee rounding on them, the gunman slapping on the rooftop a couple times. Behind the wheel, the one called Whiplash grinned, gunning the engine and driving straight for them. MJ’s spider-sense went off once more, and she leapt in the air, gasping as she felt a bullet graze her side. She landed and frantically checked herself, but her suit was merely ripped, her skin only slightly pink from the shot.

 

Well…scorpions were pretty durable. Maybe she’d gotten some of that?

 

Her spider-sense clanged again, and more bullets tore up the pavement as she made a break for it, rounding as she heard the fire stop.

 

“Fuck, reloading!” the gunman said, ducking back down into the car. MJ made a mad dash at the car as Whiplash gunned the engine again, apparently forgetting that she had lightning reflexes and could probably lift the entire vehicle clean off the ground. She jumped, executing a midair split that would have made her old cheerleading captain weep with pride, and sailed over the vehicle, holding her hands down.

 

_Thwip-thwip!_

 

The little hatch the gunman had been using was webbed up, trapping him and seriously hindering his aim. The rear passenger door opened next, and he leaned wildly out, holding his gun aloft, but Cindy was ready nearby, holding out her hands and webbing the gun away from him, yanking it to her and doing her best to disarm it, but she just ended up tossing it to ground and covering it in a thick layer of webbing.

 

“ _I’m not winding up with a round in my face because I don’t know fuck about guns_ ,” she said.

 

“ _Sounds smart_ ,” MJ nodded.

 

The two turned to face off with the car again. The two men in the vehicle seemed to realize that they were no match for actual superheroes, as the gunman shouted something before yanking his door shut.

 

“Ox, get ‘em!”

 

A thunderous crash came from behind the two, and MJ’s spider-sense buzzed again, pulling some overtime today. She leapt away as a giant metal fist slammed where she had been, twirling in the air to land on a light pole. The attack had come from what looked like the Rhino that had been part of the group that had kidnapped Peter so long ago, but upon closer inspection, it was a different person in the suit, and he had made a few modifications. Instead of a single rhino horn, the suit was sporting two extended holes on either side of the head, and they had even thought to add a ring hanging from the nose of the stylized head.

 

“Sorry, I’m late!” Ox shouted. “This fucker took like five minutes to calibrate!”

 

He turned his head to MJ and Cindy with a muted whir of gears and broke into grin.

 

“Hello, girls!”

 

He shifted the suit into its quadrupedal form and charged at Cindy, who was still on the ground, but she leapt easily away and landed next to MJ. The Ox skidded to a halt and rounded on the pole the two were clinging to, running at it with a roar of rage.

 

“Hold still, ya little cu – “

 

“Now, let’s mind our language!” a new voice said, and a green figure landed on the car and yanked the driver’s side door open, tugging it free of its hinges with what looked like minimal effort and pulling Whiplash from behind the wheel. “We should respect the ladies of the world or something, right? Pull!”

 

He threw Whiplash over his shoulder, and MJ and Cindy, along with Ox, who skidded to a halt, watched in horror as a ball of red-hot something flew at him, ripping straight through him. The man went limp in midair as he fell back to the ground with an ugly, crunching splat that would haunt MJ’s dreams forever.

 

“ _Oh my God_!” she shouted.

 

“You killed Kenny!” the green man shouted with a cackle.

 

“You bastard!” a new voice shrieked with giggles, and a rushing sound filled the air as a hoverboard sailed into view, holding a pale goblin-esque man with twin horns protruding from his forehead and glowing red eyes. “Hello, girls.”

 

His voice was like oil in a pan over a fire, slimy but with the occasional raspy pop. MJ and Cindy stared as he swooped down to join his green friend, who was dragging the gunman from the backseat, kicking and screaming.

 

“Aw, fuck, man, don’t kill me!” the gunman shouted. “OX!”

 

“You assholes’r gonna pay for that!” Ox shouted, charging forward with a roar of rage, but another hulking figure crashed through the parked cars, colliding with the enforcer and bodily lifting him.

 

“Sorry, but we’re _broke_ ,” he said, emphasizing the last word by slamming Ox into the ground, crumpling his suit. “But then, it looks like you are, too!”

 

He climbed onto the suit and began gleefully tearing it to shreds, tossing chunks of metal and cybernetics away and pounding the remains to a pulp. MJ tried not to think about Ox and all of the sharp metal bits of the suit and how those probably weren’t mixing too well.

 

“Gentlemen, I do believe we have ourselves a vehicle worthy of the Frightful Four,” the green one said in halting voice that was just above a growl but nonetheless carried to the pair as they watched, too stunned to move. “But where is the fourth?”

 

A cloud of black sailed up to the scene, looking like a shadow sliding along the ground but with dozens of pairs of yellow eyes. The shadow formed into a mass of little imp-looking shadows, which climbed and piled on top of each other to coalesce into a gray-skinned man. He was the shortest of the four, with pasty skin, matching hair that sat atop his head like a tuft of feathers, and large ram horns that curled out of the sides of his head, almost concealing his short pointed ears. He grinned, showing black teeth.

 

“Still figuring out this teleporting thing,” he said in a reedy voice, turning to the vehicle with a sharp laugh that sounded like snapping bones. “Hah! Shotgun!”

 

“No fair!” the orange one said, glancing up at MJ and Cindy. “Oh, hey, what about them? They might try to be heroes or something.”

 

“Well…” the green one said with a malicious smirk. “Give them something to hero over.”

 

Without another word, the orange goblin reared a hand back, glowing orange light growing in his fist before he hurled a gelatinous ball of orange plasma into the distance, where it splattered onto a car, the intense heat causing the engine to burst into flame immediately.

 

“Have fun, you two!” the green one said, climbing into the driver’s seat. “Anyone know how to drive!?”

 

“ _What do we do_?” Cindy asked, and MJ shook her head as the goblins took off, mounting the curb and simply driving along the sidewalk.

 

“ _One of us would just get our ass kicked if we went after them_ ,” she said, hurrying toward the flaming car. “We have to make sure – “

 

……

 

_BOOM!_

 

An explosion rocked the street, and the two picked up the pace, crawling along the sides of the buildings along the way and leaping toward the flaming car. Those few people still clinging to the hope that traffic would get moving again were now abandoning their cars, grabbing children, pets, or belongings and rushing away.

 

Good.

“ _Silk, there’s still someone in there_!” MJ shouted, and Cindy landed on a car, hopping from roof to roof toward a newer-model Chevy Traverse not unlike the one Cindy’s father had bought recently after receiving a handsome bonus for closing a deal of some kind at work. It was even the same color and had the stupid Minions bumper sticker Mom loved so much…. And…a very familiar head of wild, untamable black locks sitting limply in the backseat.

 

Wait….

 

“ _Oh my God, AL_!” Cindy shouted, hopping onto the roof of the smoking vehicle. She reared a fist back and punched through the metal, peeling it away as a fresh wave of smoke billowed out, but her mask kept the bulk of the irritation at bay. MJ took to the front seat, yanking the doors away and pulling away Cindy’s parents as she reached down into the car and ripped her brother’s seatbelt off, sliding him smoothly out of his seat and through the hole in the roof. The engine had sparked and blown up, sending metal shrapnel all through the vehicle. By some miracle, none of it had gotten in their chests or faces. What plasma the one goblin thing had thrown, though, had splashed onto Al’s legs, and Cindy sobbed as she assessed the damage.

 

It wasn’t pretty.

 

“ _Someone call 911_!” MJ shouted, and Cindy shook her head.

 

“ _Are you kidding_!?” she said frantically. “ _They’ll never get an ambulance out here, not in this mess_!”

 

“ _Need a hand_?” a new voice said, and a glowing pink aura announced the arrival of Mayday, floating down from on high, accompanied by…someone new….

 

“Friends of the progenitor,” he said, glancing between them. “We must act quickly. Wounds to heal, pain to feel.”

 

“ _Who’s this_?” MJ asked, and Mayday shrugged.

 

“ _My…uncle_?” she suggested. “ _I’ll explain later. I can carry the little guy so he won’t get shaken up on the trip. C’mon. Spidercide, can you get the dad_?”

 

“Father, can you hear me?” Spidercide said in a singsong voice as he hefted Cindy’s father.

 

“ _You sure about this guy_?” Cindy asked Mayday, who nodded.

 

“ _He’s a…another clone of Spider-Man_ ,” she said. “ _If nothing else, that should mean he’s a good person_.”

 

……

 

This wasn’t good. This wasn’t good.

 

“This is _not_ good,” Hobie told himself as he hurried along the hallway to the familiar lab. He skidded to a halt and knocked twice.

 

“Enter,” a clipped voice came from beyond, and Hobie stepped in to see the sight he had dreaded. Oliver Osnick was glaring at the wall of video displays showing New York City in utter chaos. Screen after screen showed the sort of scenes that Hobie had dreamed of. Anarchy, the toppling of the kings, the little guy taking back the city.

 

The problem was, the little guy was also ripping the city apart, rioting and looting and causing general mayhem. That wasn’t what Hobie had wanted at all. He wanted new guards, not every man for himself. They were supposed to band together, not turn on each other.

 

Sighing, he approached and stood slightly behind Osnick’s right shoulder.

 

“It would seem Kaine has played his trump card,” Osnick said flatly, and Hobie nodded. “How childish. Rather than try to one-up my own efforts, he seeks to render them moot. No matter, no matter. I have contingencies in place for this sort of thing.”

 

He strode over to another console and tapped a few buttons, clicking his mouse around.

 

“The Delta Series, sir?” Hobie said, and Osnick grinned at him, a manic expression that was more than a little unsettling.

 

“You saw how they loved Alpha,” he said, gesturing toward the screens, toward New York. “They even gave him a charming nickname. What will they make of an army of his grandchildren?”

 

“Are they ready, sir?” Hobie asked, and Osnick pressed one last button, a shuddering, grinding of metal coming from above.

 

“We shall find out,” he said. “Let us use Kaine’s ambitions against him. If he wants to tear down the city, he’s only making it easier for us to rebuild. Today, Mr. Brown, we take a step toward the future.”

 

……

 

Boy, this is a blast from the past.

 

“What are these things?” Illyana asked, rearing back her sword (such a nice sword!) and bringing it down in an arc that sliced the tail off of one of the lizards advancing on us.

 

Apparently, someone else got a hold of Dr. Connors’s serum. He’s not gonna be happy about that.

 

“ _Careful, they’re human_ ,” I say. “ _They’re just mutated. It’s a serum designed by Curt Connors_.”

 

“Then we will only knock them out,” Piotr says. “Yes, sister?”

 

Illyana nimbly dodges away from several swipes, retreating back to where Piotr and I are standing and holding her sword aloft.

 

“Are you sure?” she asks. “I have seen demons prettier than these things.”

 

“Magik,” Piotr says in a scolding tone. “We have a responsibility to help these people.”

 

I knew I liked this guy for a reason.

 

The lizards converge on us, and I dart forward to uppercut one in its long, reptilian jaw, which cracks a bit, sending it flying a few feet off the ground and spinning to a landing. Before he’s even on the ground, I turn and kick another across the face, sending him sprawling as well. I duck under a swipe from another, dodging away from a lunge and sending a spray of webs toward a cluster of about three. They’re webbed together, and thanks to some upgrades from Aiko, my new and improved webs trap them fairly effectively. I roll away as another lizard slashes at the ground where I was, glad for my spider-sense as I leap to my feet. More alarm bells sound in my head, and as the lizard in front of me takes another swipe, I can hear the rattling, guttural growl of another behind me.

 

Well, this is a tight spot.

 

_Clung!_

 

The sound of something solidly and heavily metal-based connecting with one of my foes echoes out, and if it was satisfying before, it’s extra so now. Spider-sense fades a bit, leaving the lizard in front of me, which is fairly simple. I jump away, spinning in the air and webbing the lizard’s claw to the ground, webbing his other claw to the first one as he tries to rip it away. I land to see that Piotr has handled the other lizard in a bit more…forward manner.

 

“It is hard work,” Piotr says with a metallic grin at me. “But I am harder.”

 

“ _Phrasing_ ,” I say, looking around. Illyana is dispatching the last of the lizards in just as blunt a fashion as her brother, smacking them upside the face with the flat of her enormous sword. As the last reptilian crumples to the ground, she makes her way over with a little smile.

 

“Okay, that was fun,” she says, and I make a note to never aggravate any member of this family. She leans in to look more closely at me. “Are you feeling okay? How is your head?”

 

“ _I’m fine_ ,” I swear. Despite how scary she can be sometimes, Illyana (and her brother, for that matter) seems to be especially concerned about the possibility of a concussion or something, despite my insistence that my spider healing factor is more than enough to come back from a minor explosion.

 

“If you insist,” Illyana says with a little smile at me. “Your girlfriend would be quite upset if I let you get even _more_ brain damage.”

 

“ _You have been spending entirely too much time with Kitty_ ,” I tell her, and she grins.

 

“Too much or not enough?” she asks.

 

“ _Definitely too much_ ,” I say, sighing as I web up the remaining lizards, leaving them for SHIELD to find. If they ever get their communications array working again. Speaking of which…. “ _Any word from SHIELD_?”

 

“None,” Piotr says apologetically. “Whatever inhuman is disrupting our communications has not been stopped yet.”

 

“I’m sure your friends are fine,” Illyana says with a smirk. “I bet they’re just as worried about you, in fact.”

 

“ _That’s part of the problem, actually_ ,” I admit. My worry-happy brain can’t seem to decide which scenario is better. My friends being alright and terrified about my own well-being, or me being fine and worried about them for no reason?

 

Sadly, I’m perfectly content to rest on the worst of both worlds. They’re in danger but still thinking only about me, because that’s just how they are. Richard and Mary Parker must have just been a couple of worry-warts for me to end up like this. Thanks a lot Mom and Dad.

 

Ugh, I don’t mean that.

 

I only sort of mean that.

 

“Hey, are you alright?” Illyana says as I trudge along. It’s nearing midnight, and even though I just woke up a few hours ago, I wasn’t exactly sleeping as much as I was knocked unconscious, and I don’t feel particularly rested. My limbs are heavy, and I’m having a bit of trouble focusing on my surroundings. “Let’s find a place to hold up for the night. Brother?”

 

“I have him, sister,” Piotr says, and I’m scooped up, the metal man once again lifting me into his arms. I could take a moment and ponder that this is rather emasculating, but frankly, it’s nice to just relax and let my whole body go limp. Even if resting on what are essentially two metal beams isn’t that comfortable, not having to hold myself up under my own strength is pretty nice.

 

“ _So…was it weird to just be able to…turn metal one day_?” I ask, trying not to think too much about the fact that I’m being carried bridal-style by a giant metal Russian man.

 

Edpool would have a fit over this.

 

“It was…jarring, to say the least,” Piotr says. “If not for Professor Xavier, I would likely have followed a path not unlike yours. Saving people using my powers.”

 

“ _Yeah_?” I ask.

 

“Of course,” Piotr says. “If someone is born with powers like mine, or if they acquire amazing abilities such as yours, it is their duty to use those powers to make the world a better place. I did not ask to be the way I am, and I would likely have not picked this fate, but I was dealt this hand, and I must use it to better mankind as much as I can.”

 

“ _With great power, there must also come great responsibility_ ,” I say, and Piotr pauses for a moment, nodding.

 

“That is…a very apt summary of why I do what I do,” Piotr admits, and I grin behind my mask.

 

“ _My, uh…my uncle…told me that a while back_ ,” I tell him. “ _I never really took it to heart until…it was too late_.”

 

“Oh,” Piotr sighs. “He….”

 

“ _It was just…a total accident, everyone says_ ,” I say. “ _But…if I’d been…a better person. A better me_.”

 

“You stop that right now,” Piotr says. “Hindsight is a bitter thing. We can look back on the past with regret, or we can simply see it for what it is. A learning experience. Often, the most life-changing lessons come at the biggest cost, but all we can do is decide if the cost was worth the lesson learned. I am sure your uncle would be proud of the man you have become. And if his unfortunate passing was the price to pay for the countless lives you have already saved, the ones you will continue to save, then I am sure he would make that sacrifice all over again. Because he was a selfless man who raised a hero. I may be presumptuous, but that is simply what I believe.”

 

I’m silent for a long moment, wondering for a moment if Piotr is simply the person I would have become had I been born in, like…Siberia or something.

 

“ _I…don’t think that sounds presumptuous at all_ ,” I say, attempting to sit up. He lets me slide out of his arms, apparently respecting my own ability to determine if I’m able to walk. “ _It’s just hard to look at…what happened and consider it…you know, ‘worth it’ in any sense_.”

 

“That is understandable,” Piotr says. “It would be disingenuous of you to measure your uncle’s life against anything, let alone the lives of others. All you can do is strive to be the man he obviously knew you could be. I of course never knew him, but judging by what he has taught you, I know that he was, above all, a good man, and he would want you to be nothing less than the same.”

 

“Colossus,” Illyana says, a scolding note to her voice. “I am sure Spider-Man doesn’t need to – “

 

“ _No, it’s fine_ ,” I insist. “ _I think…maybe that was just what I needed to hear_.”

 

……

 

“This is not at all what I need to be hearing right now!” Gwen shouted frantically at the TV, which steadfastly refused to reveal anything about the particular whereabouts of Spider-Man. “Where is Peter!?”

 

“Hey,” Julie said to Riley, who glanced down at her questioningly. “Go…hug her or something.”

 

“But I’m not – “

 

“Hug her,” Julie insisted, even giving Riley a little shove, and Riley shuffled towards Gwen, tentatively gripping at her shoulders. Gwen squirmed away from the grip, spinning and spotting her boyfriend’s female clone. She huffed but clung to Riley’s shoulders, gripping her and pulling her in for a hug.

 

“He’s okay, isn’t he?” Gwen asked. “You would know, right?”

 

“I sense no disturbance in the Force,” Riley said with a nervous laugh, and Gwen went still for a moment before snickering, shaking against Riley.

 

“You are such a fucking nerd,” she said, and Riley shrugged.

 

“Sorry, got it from your boyfriend,” she said, looking down and immediately regretting her decision. Gwen was looking right back up with her with that same penetrating gaze she often got lately when Riley tapped into her “Peter Parker” side just a little too much. She’d been trying to distance herself from her male counterpart, her “original” model, but being Peter Parker was all she really knew. So when Gwen got these intense looks, Riley didn’t know what to do. It felt like someone was seeing right through her façade, peeling away the layers of “Riley Benson” to expose the Peter Parker underneath.

 

And that was just uncomfortable.

 

“Just…tell me he’s okay,” Gwen said, and Riley nodded.

 

“He’s fine,” she insisted. “You survived that crash, right? So he would. We’re all incredibly sturdy. He’s probably just…hung up saving everyone he possibly can on the way here.”

 

Riley was rewarded with a nervous bubbly giggle from Gwen. “That sounds just like you two,” she said, and Riley bit her lip at those words.

 

You two.

 

Keeping them similar but still distinctly separate. It was just like Gwen to come up with something so perfect for the two of them.

 

“Gwen, look!” Julie shouted, gesturing frantically at the screen, which showed –

 

“Peter!” Gwen squeaked, hurrying closer and grabbing the remote to turn up the volume.

 

“ _…the only ones doing their best to help the citizens of New York. The self-styled superhero group The Neighborhood Watch apparently heard Mayor Colbert’s impassioned plea and took to the streets to rescue anyone they could from the chaos engulfing the Big Apple. What you are seeing now is amateur footage of Spider-Man in the company of X-Man and Avenger Colossus as well as newcomer Magik, rumored to be an apprentice of Dr. Stephen Strange. The three appear to be facing off against a gang of mutated lizard-men. Spider-Fans can rest easy, though, as he emerged victorious and left the scene shortly after rounding up the lizards and restraining them. To see the full video, exclusively from Channel Four News, just go to our website, shown on the screen. Now, for those of you just joining us…_ ”

 

Gwen turned the volume back down, slumping onto the couch. “Oh, thank God,” she sighed. “Thank God, he made it.”  


“And he’s with Magik,” Julie said. “Illyana really likes Pete, so she won’t let him get hurt.”

 

“Plus, like…giant metal guy,” Riley added. “I know a bit about Colossus, and he’s a good tank.”

 

“What we should do,” Johnny said, strolling in, “is get some sleep. Sue and Ben are keeping everything we have looking for the others. You guys should rest. It’s been a shitty day for all of us.”

 

“ _Yo, Johnny_ ,” Ben Grimm’s voice came over the loudspeaker set in the Baxter Building ceiling. “ _Incoming. Three girls and guy_.”

 

The elevator opened, and an exhausted-looking Harry staggered out first with Jubilee, MJ, and a sobbing Cindy in tow. Gwen and Riley hurried forward, Gwen gripping Cindy’s shoulders.

 

“Cin, what’s wrong?” she asked, and Cindy sniffled, babbling out something that was probably supposed to be a response, but she was too emotional to even form words.

 

“Got her,” Riley said, leading Cindy toward the couch, settling her in and patting her back, letting her just relax into the cushions.

 

“What happened?” Gwen asked MJ, who sighed, making her way to the nearest seat and falling into it.

 

“Some of the inhumans are…bad news,” she said. “Like…really bad. There’s four of them, and they’re like…goblins or something. They’re all completely insane.”

 

“One of them attacked me,” Harry said. “Like…me, as Harry Osborn. He’s got a real hate-boner for me. I don’t know who they could be, but they’re strong. Strong enough to handle us one-on-one.”

 

“Well, we just won’t give them that chance,” Riley said with a solid nod, rubbing Cindy’s back. “What happened with her?”

 

“Her brother got hit pretty bad,” MJ said. “Not on purpose, just…caught in the crossfire. He’s in the hospital, and he’s stabilized, but…he probably won’t have his legs after this.”

 

“Oh my God,” Gwen said, hurrying over to Cindy’s side and hugging her. “Cin, I’m so sorry.”

 

“He’s just a little kid!” Cindy burst out. “He’s…. He never did anything to…deserve something like this. He’s just a stupid little kid, and now he has to…to deal with this! He has to grow up with…this, and he doesn’t even understand that sometimes the world is just shit!”

 

A long silence punctuated this little outburst, Riley still gently rubbing at Cindy’s back as a few ideas started to pull together in her head.

 

“Um…Cindy, if you want,” she said, “I could talk to Tony. He’s on a cybernetics trip right now. Prosthetic limbs and stuff. I bet he’d love a chance to…you know, whip up some new legs for your brother. Obviously, it’s not the same, but he could definitely keep his mobilit—oh!”

 

Cindy lunged in, squeezing Riley tightly with a watery giggle. “S-sorry,” she gasps. “But…could you really do that?”

 

“No problem,” Riley said, shaking her head. “Heck, Tony would love the chance to show off.”

 

“We’re all here for you, Cindy,” Gwen said, also patting Cindy gently on the back as well. “We _all_ just need to be here for each other.”

 

“Yeah, that’s what the Watch is about,” Harry said, making his way over to flop onto a couch, pulling Jubilee with him and just sort of cuddling her. “We’re all here to help each other out. So we all get some rest and regroup to rescue our pals.”

 

Riley nodded, feeling the exhaustion of the day catching up with her. She’d been running on adrenaline, but the moment Harry had mentioned rest, she became aware of how very tired she was. Maybe they all just needed to rest. All they could do was count on the other Watch members to keep safe, and they would regroup tomorrow.

 

And then, the Neighborhood Watch would show the city how they truly responded to a disaster.


	17. Chapter 17

“Captain.”

 

George looked up to see Wade Wilson himself settling onto the bleachers next to him. Here was a living legend, literally. George still had boxes of old comics in protective plastic sleeves upstairs, some of them featuring the very figure sitting next to him, in the flesh. Come to think of it, he could probably arrange to have Wilson sign them. They’d sure sell for a pretty penny then.

 

“Captain,” was all George said back, and Wade chuckled a bit. They were both Captains, after all, albeit in extremely different ways. “Long day.”

 

“Only gonna get worse,” Wilson said, resting his elbows on his knees. “Nick told me they’re calling in the National Guard, but the Army’s ready to move in, too.”

 

They both looked around the gymnasium. Currently, George was holed up in the Midtown High gymnasium with a rather sizable group of people he’d rescued with the aid of Gwen’s friends, Ricochet and Phage. More refugees were arriving each hour, and Captain America had been sent in with two highly-trained SHIELD agents, Becky Barnes and Sharon Rogers, to coordinate an extraction. They were only now awaiting a contingent of SHIELD soldiers to help with the massive group of people. Word seemed to have gotten out that Captain America himself was helping with this particular shelter, drawing more and more people simply seeking refuge from the craziness that had become New York.

 

“Does it ever get to you?” Wilson asked, leaning back and staring up at the ceiling. “How many people are depending on you to just…not fuck it up?”

 

“Never,” George said, shaking his head. “The way I see it, if you’re willing to let one person depend on you, you have to be willing to let everyone depend on you. To each of these people, I’m the one person they have. Why should I pay any one of them less attention than the other?”

 

Wilson chuckled, glancing over at him. “Maybe we should juice you up with some super-soldier serum,” he said. “You’d be a great Captain.”

 

“I’m already a captain, remember?” George said with a grim smile. He let a sigh, eyeing the gym, the school around them. A place of learning had been turned to a place of refuge, but it still held memories, probably for quite a few of these people. The juxtaposition of youth with the harsh realities of adulthood. “You know…I went to school here.”

 

“Yeah?” Wilson asked him, and George nodded.

 

“Typical childhood story, really,” he said. “Met a girl, fell in love. Married my high-school sweetheart and had a kid, hoped to build a life for her just as happy as the one I had.”

 

“But time marches on,” Wilson said. “Next thing you know, everything’s changed, and the life you had just…can’t happen anymore. Things aren’t that simple.”

 

“I don’t understand it sometimes,” George said with a sigh. “Everything went so well back then. Why do we have to change it? Why do we have to make things so…complicated?”

 

“Alright, Avril Lavigne,” Wilson said with a snort, and George looked at him uncomprehendingly. “Sorry, song I know. Listen, and take this from someone who was around when things were a _lot_ simpler. Complicated doesn’t always have to be worse. In my prime, a kid could get sick because he didn’t boil his water before drinking it. A flu was a reason to fear for someone’s life. Sure, we complicated things, but if things weren’t like this, humanity would have probably died out decades ago. We reached a point where natural selection would have had us dying off, but we grabbed science by the balls and made it work _for_ us. Fact is, the only way to keep humankind going is to complicate the hell of things, to leave behind puzzles for future generations to figure out. Mankind has become its own method of natural selection, and if we can leave behind a world this insane and know that we’ll come back from it, we know we can handle anything.”

 

“But…Gwen,” George said, sighing. “I just wanted her to have a…a normal life.”

 

Wilson shook his head. “You are not the type of guy to raise a…a citizen,” he said. “You should be proud that your daughter is not only following in your footsteps but…blazing a trail. I know what you wanted. Same thing I dreamt of for my future kids. School, a job, a house, kids, all the stuff I wanted. But that’s progress. The American Dream is constantly being rewritten, modified, changed. Because that’s what America is, that’s what it represents. Change. Dirty, bloody, necessary change. We forge ahead through the paths that other people look at and freak out. That’s why other countries look at us and shake their heads. We’re the Millennials. We are a country of people looking at what we’ve been given and just…freaking the fuck out and improvising. Superpowers? Mutants? Inhumans? We’re dealing with it. And that’s all anyone of us can be expected to do. Deal with it.”

 

“I…suppose you have a good point,” George said. He could sit here and look fondly upon the past and wish Gwen could have the same thing he had had, or he could accept the reality that the past was past and the future was now. Gwen wouldn’t grow up to be a well-adjusted young woman, go to Midtown High, and marry Peter Parker, popping out a couple of grandkids for George while pursuing higher education and changing the world in a small, scientific way.

 

No, Gwen Stacy was bound to grow up, come into her own as a superhero akin to Captain America, and change the world from behind a mask, giving girls the world over an icon to aspire to be. Gwen was like her mother, aspiring to go above and beyond her forebears, so why would she accept a career as a scientist or some-such? No, Gwen would follow in her mother’s footsteps, wowing the world with something it had never seen before.

 

And George could only hope that he would have front row seats to such a show.

 

……

 

  1. Jonah Jameson had never thought that he would have front row seats to his very own superhero fight. It seemed that life was bound and determined to prove him wrong in every aspect, though, as he was watching the heroes he’d spent his recent months vilifying now doing their level best to ensure he didn’t wind up a smear on his office wall.



 

Funny a world.

 

“Do you see this, you super-powered punks!?” Jonah yelled, ducking behind his desk. “You have no place in this city! The Neighborhood Watch runs this town!”

 

“Jeez, someone’s done a one-eighty,” the ice kid said in a grumble, sending a ball of ice at a shotgun one of his attackers was toting. Apparently, there had been a prison-break nearby, and a lot of those prisoners were upset with Jonah’s passion at how detrimental they were to society! So maybe he’d been a bit vocal in his opinions. Maybe he’d used the words “worthless” and “cowardly” on more than one occasion!

 

They were!

 

“What, never seen a hypocrite before!?” Jonah yelled, crawling under his desk and unfolding a secret compartment to reveal his prize, a hunting rifle that he used to take out on weekends during deer season. If it was good enough for a buck, it was good enough for criminal scum! He loaded it up, still crouched behind his desk, and peeked over. “C’mon, boys, we’re taking back this city!”

 

“I mean, I like the change in attitude, but you gotta calm down,” the electric guy said. “Like…yesterday, you published an article talking about how I feed off of electricity and it’s my fault streetlights fuck up and cause traffic jams.”

 

“Which is untrue for about a hundred different reasons,” the ice kid added, looking indignant on his friend’s behalf as he sent a wave of ice toward the doorway to Jonah’s office, encasing it in a thick barrier that would buy them a few minutes.

 

“Alright, alright,” Jonah said. “You boys get me outta this, you can count on the Daily Bugle to sing your praises every damn day until this paper goes belly-up! I will personally make sure that every reader is a fan!”

 

“I want that shit in writing,” Electric Boy said as something burst through the ice with a heated explosion.

 

_Whump-BOOM!_

 

Jonah felt a wave of heat on his face, blistering his skin and making him clench his eyes shut and duck behind his desk. Once the noise dissipated and the heat faded, he poked his head back out to see his office door gone, blown away along with the wall around it. Small fires had sprung up along the edges of the jagged round hole left behind, and in the center stood a woman that Jonah would have taken some time to appreciate if the circumstances had been different.

 

“Hello, Jameson,” she said in a sultry voice, stalking forward. She was wearing a prison jumpsuit with the arms and legs torn off, and she had done away with the undershirt, leaving a bit of cleavage showing, which Jameson wasn’t proud to say he observed quite closely. “Nothing personal, but some Maggia folks aren’t happy with some of the stuff you’ve said about them in your little rag.”

 

“What did you say about my paper!?” Jameson said, leveling his rifle at her. “I don’t take kindly to insults, little lady! You’d best take that back before my new friends here make you pay!”

 

“Woah, woah, we are so not friends,” the icy one said. “Acquaintances, maybe.”

 

“Unfortunately,” the zappy kid added.

 

“Looks like your journalism habits have come back to bite you in the ass,” the woman said, folding her arms and tossing her dark brown hair over her shoulders before fixing him with a cool blue gaze. “Even the famous Neighborhood Watch is only saving you because they _have_ to. Maybe if you hadn’t spent your whole career ripping apart everything that doesn’t fit into your outdated Red-Blooded American view, you would actually have some friends and not people that just tolerate you.”

 

Jonah, glared at her, but rather than fire his rifle, he just gripped it tightly, her words hitting him like knives, cutting deep with their truth. He had set out to tear down fakes, liars, impostors. The Daily Bugle had been meant to be a bastion of truth, ripping away the pedestals that others would put these “heroes” on, to approach everything with a healthy amount of skepticism. At some point, though, skepticism had become cynicism, and even genuine, good people like these two young men defending him despite him giving them every reason not to were victims of the Daily Bugle’s scorn.

 

No, that wouldn’t stand.

 

“Well, lady, people change,” he said. “And here I am, eating my words while you bust outta prison and go right back to being criminal filth! If you were actually newsworthy, I’d have you on the front page tomorrow with the headline ‘Hypocrite Exposed’!”

 

She snorted and leveled her hands at him, but before she could send out more explosions, ice coated her fists, which glowed orange before the ice exploded away in shards of shrapnel.

 

“Alright,” the ice kid said. “Maybe we’re friends.”

 

“But like…tentatively,” Electric Boy said, floating up and zipping toward the explody girl with lightning crackling in his hand.

 

Hey, that was good enough for now.

 

……

 

“Do you think we did enough?” Lana asked as the trio staggered tiredly down the street toward the Oscorp Penthouse, wearing their civilian clothes.

 

“Ask Pete,” Jess said, smiling over at her, though her expression showed that she was just as worn, her eyes blinking heavily. “He’ll tell you it was more than enough.”  


“He’s such a goody-goody dork,” Kitty sad with a soft snort, and Lana nodded.

 

“I wanna just fucking…hit him sometimes,” she admitted. “Like…stop making me a better person, it’s so annoying.”

 

“You know he’d let you,” Jess said with a smirk. “He was being a goofball the other day, and I smacked him the shoulder, and I swear I could see him start to dodge and then just let me hit him.”

 

“What an idiot,” Lana said with a shake of her head. “I love him.”

 

“Yeah,” Jess said.

 

“Same,” Kitty added.

 

The three rounded a corner, and as one, they all stopped, Lana’s jaw dropping.

 

“Um, so…I don’t think Harry’s place is open for business,” she said, eyeing the burned-out husk of a building. Certain areas were still glowing with piles of embers, and smoke continued to curl away into the night sky, glowing in the light from the streetlamps. As they watched, a few floors collapsed inward with an echoing crash.

 

“What the hell happened?” Jess asked, glancing between the other two, who just shrugged. “Lana, have you been keeping an eye on the frequency? Kitty and I can’t wear the earwigs, remember?”

 

“I’ve been listening all day!” Lana insisted, pulling her phone out of her bag. “Oh, wait, it lost synchronization a while back…. Oops.”

 

“Lana!” Jess said.

 

“Don’t make me use ‘danger zone’ unironically!” Kitty said, and Lana held up an accusatory finger.

 

“I will blow all three of us up right now,” she insisted. She tapped the button to resynchronize, and there was a spinning logo for a few seconds before a message game up showing one new recording on an emergency frequency. She quickly played the recording.

 

“ _This is Dusk to Neighborhood Watch_ ….”

 

“Johnny sent out a message a few hours ago,” Lana said, listening to it. “He wants us to meet up at ‘his place’.”

 

“That’s gotta be the Baxter Building,” Kitty said, and Jess nodded.

 

“If we’re gonna ride out the apocalypse, that’s the best place for it,” she said, glancing at Lana. “Is your GPS up yet?”

 

“Nah,” Lana said with a grumble, shaking her head as she glanced at her phone. “Is there a mutant with the power of…lag or something? Because he’s going ape-shit with it.”

 

“Well, looks like we’ll have to find it the old-fashioned way,” Jess said. “Maybe we can find some tourist-trap shop and get a map or – “

 

_WHOOSH-Shoom!_

 

They all stopped and looked skyward as an armor-clad figure swooped in and landed in front of them with a solid _clung_ that rattled the pavement under their feet. Blue armor whirred as a suite not quite as big as Norman Osborn’s but still imposingly tall stood in front of them. A glowing white arc reactor shone at them from its chest, along with white slits for eyes and twin white lights shining from Tony Stark’s palms.

 

It had to be him, or one of his iron-clad pals, Rhodey or Carol.

 

“ _Hey_ ,” he said, and Lana recognized Tony’s lightly distorted voice. “ _So, good to know you three are okay, but there’s about to be a lot of fighting happening around here, so you need to clear out before – “_

 

“SMASH!”

 

“ _Yeah, the smashing_ ,” Tony said, glancing around as the shout echoed along the high buildings around them. His armor whirred as he gestured at them with a “shoo-shoo” motion. “ _How about ten big-steps back, and we can talk more, okay? Pretty please_?”

 

Lana felt Kitty take her wrist, and there was that…weird, awful feeling of all outside sensation stopping. She couldn’t feel the light breeze around her, couldn’t hear the soft rush as wind rustled her hair against her ears. Her body simply ceased to recognize any external physical force. Kitty had rendered her intangible once before, bricking her cellphone _and_ her iPod full of her favorite songs. Lana might have been a bit more upset, but a building had been collapsing around them, so it had been either retain her phone and some playlists or her life.

 

Lana had shrugged off Kitty’s numerous apologies for the lost tech, only begrudgingly letting Pete replace them.

 

Now, Kitty felt the soft fizzling pop as her earbud shorted out in her ear, her phone no doubt scrambling itself into a useless collection of circuitry. She could only hope that Kitty wouldn’t phase her through her clothes by accident.

 

Gwen was still afraid to show her face in Harlem, despite the fact that her mask had made it through the incident.

 

“Toe—uh…Iron Man, what’s happening?” Kitty asked, and Tony glanced up, leaping away and taking to the air as a large yellow figure landed in their midst. He was huge, easily twice as tall as Tony’s fancy armor, with splotchy skin the color of mustard that had been left out for a bit too long. His hair was a dark, grayish yellow, and his eyes glowed (surprise) yellow as he turned his attention to Tony.

 

“Get away from Bruce!” the monster yelled, tearing toward the blue armor.

 

“ _Oh…boy_ ,” Tony eked out, but he needn’t have worried, as an equally massive green creature sailed into view, rattling the ground as he landed in front of the big yellow guy. There was an earth-shattering _CRASH_ as the two collided, locking hands and grappling.

 

“Bruce…stop!” the Hulk yelled as he slowly shoved what had to be his yellow fraternal twin brother away from the others. “Don’t be scared!”

 

“Leave Bruce alone!” the yellow one shouted, writhing and scrambling to get away from the Hulk’s grip. “Bruce afraid!”

 

“Is that a yellow Hulk?” Kitty asked in a limp voice.

 

“ _He seems to react to fear like the Hulk reacts to anger_ ,” Tony said, swooping back down to them. “ _And we have ourselves a stalemate. The yellow one gets stronger over time, and the green one gets stronger the angrier her gets_.”  


“Green one gets pissed that Yellow is stronger, gets stronger in turn, which freaks out Yellow,” Lana said.

 

“ _At this point, we’re considering luring them both into the ocean_ ,” Tony said. “ _Or a rocket. In any case, my spidery protégé would hate to find out that I got his lady-friends into danger, so how about you three clear out and head off to the Baxter Building?_ ”

 

“We’re sort of trying to figure out how to get there,” Jess said, and Tony nodded with a soft whir of his armor.

 

“ _Two blocks thataway and then another three that way_ ,” he said, gesturing down the street and then to Lana’s left. “ _Can’t miss it; the building seriously has a big number three carved into it. Like…way to be subtle_.”

 

“ _Iron Man!_ ” a new voice said, and a large suit of gray armor landed nearby, stalking toward Tony. “ _We need to contain this—oh, hello, girls_.”

 

“Hi,” Kitty said to what had to be Norman Osborn. The armor he was wearing looked like an updated Iron Goblin armor without the green paint job.

 

“ _Have you…heard any news from the other members of the Watch_?” Norman asked, and Lana shook her head along with Jess as Kitty spoke.

 

“Nothing,” she said. “We got an emergency thing from Dusk, but he didn’t mention anything serious, just a place to meet up.”

 

“If there was…anything serious to report, he probably would have mentioned it,” Jess said, and Norman nodded. Lana had to give him credit for being so worried about his son. Lana wished her own mother had been half as concerned about her safety. Pete had told her that if there was one thing to be happy about, it was that her fucked-up life had eventually reached the point where she was part of his life, and he was really happy about that.

 

Fucking…sappy asshole.

 

The two Hulks were drawing closer with their lemon-lime fight, trading blows that shook the air around them with small thunderclaps, and Norman gestured at them to get back.

 

“ _I appreciate the update_ ,” he said. “ _You three need to get to a safe place, though. If you run into the…Wasp…tell him that I’m rooting for him_.”

 

“Will do,” Kitty said, glancing between the other two girls. “Alright, let’s stay together for a couple blocks so we don’t have to worry about debris. Neither of you let go.”

 

“You’re the one with the death-grip on our wrists,” Jess said, sounding more amused than anything as Kitty led them away. “Good luck, Iron Man!”

 

“ _Keep your heads on a swivel_!” Tony called back.

 

Kitty led them away, straight through a weird-ass boutique that only seemed to sell bondage gear and…other accessories and out the other side to an abandoned street. In the distance, through other, shorter surrounding buildings, Lana could just make out a building with a stylized number “3” carved into the sides.

 

“The Baxter Building,” Jess said, her gaze moving over the other two. “Let’s go.”

 

……

 

“C’mon, let’s just forget about the Osborn kid and go cause some ruckus!”

 

“No!” he shouted, glowering at the other goblins gathered around him. The Gray Goblin was prowling circles around the rest. Hobgoblin was resting, looking close to a nap as his hulking yellow figure curled up into a muscly blob.  Demogoblin was the one goading him right now, smirking at him. The expression lacked any sort of amusement, though, more of a leer than anything. “We stick to the plan! Make Harry Osborn suffer, and then we can take control of this – “

 

“This city is giving us every chance to seize it!” Demogoblin said. “You’re so bent on your revenge that you don’t even see a golden opportunity!”

 

“He’s right, you know,” Gray Goblin said, turning briefly into a pile of shadowy imps before crawling up to them and coalescing back together. “And really, what better way to get your revenging on Osborn than by tearing his world down around his ears? We burned his house down, we got his dad’s business, now we can take his home city from him, leave him with nothing.”

 

“Ooooh, now you’re speaking my language,” he said, pondering this angle. “Hmmm, you got a point. I was thinking too small scale. This isn’t the Count of Monte Cristo, this is…Kronos against the gods themselves. We’re agents of time, agents of change, the instrument of a higher power we can’t hope to comprehend.”

 

“Hey, you wanna go with that, go for it,” Demogoblin said with a shrug. “All I’m saying is, this is a helluva opportunity, and we need to – “

 

“Yo, guys,” Overdrive said, striding over and gesturing over his shoulder. “Hate to interrupt your little war council, but your chariot awaits.”

 

“It’s ready?” Hobgoblin said, stirring and lumbering to his feet. “We can go make war now!?”

 

“Suped up and waiting for a buncha crazies like you to take her out,” Overdrive said, wiping his hands on a greasy cloth. “Least I can do after you sprung me.”

 

“How about you stick around?” Green Goblin said, gesturing around the old abandoned subway station they’d appropriated. “Some of our other pals will be coming through with some stuff to spruce the place up a bit, and maybe we’ll just make this a place to call home for those without one to do so.”

 

“Hell, I might just do that,” Overdrive said, waving them off as the four made their way down the old subway tunnel to where they’d parked their new vehicle at a surface exit. “You kids go have fun.”

 

The Frightful Four had a city to take over.

 

……

 

“This chaos is just going to take over the whole city at this rate,” Madelyn said, ambling along the streets, stretching out her awareness to check behind her every sixty-three picoseconds to make sure Jarvis was still following her. In reality, she needed only to listen for the soft metallic thuds of his footfalls, but it was reassuring to peek back and take a quick listen in on his various syntaxes and subroutines. He was so…complex in his simplicity. Tony had programmed him with somewhat vague parameters but also given him plenty of leeway to interpret these parameters as he saw fit. What resulted was a program capable of learning but not altogether concerned with doing so if it wasn’t necessary to his purpose.

 

In other words, Jarvis was programmed to be content, and he seemed to be. Walking along behind Madelyn, she could hear a gentle worry about Tony but also a series of backup routines making sure he didn’t lose focus on other objectives, like the preservation of Project Vision. Of her.

 

Like _she_ was the one that needed protecting. She could flatten just about any common street thug like a pancake. Jarvis was the one that needed protecting, with his rather fragile Iron Legion body and single data chit containing his entire existence. Still, he followed dutifully behind her like some sort of royal guard protecting his princess.

 

Okay, Madelyn might have been injecting some of her own hopes and dreams into that one.

 

It was so strange, having hopes and dreams. She was two hours old; by human standards, she should still be in some glass incubation crib in a hospital maternity ward, not wandering the streets of New York in the grips of some kind of localized apocalypse.

 

“ _Oh, dear_ ,” Jarvis said, hurrying forward and taking her hand in his metal one. Even though he had only the most basic of bodies, his hand cold alloy, she still felt a simulated blush rising to her cheeks, and she quickly cancelled those subroutines. Why were they automatic!?

 

“What’s the matter, Jarvis?” she asked.

 

“ _We must find shelter_ ,” Jarvis said, tugging urgently at her. “ _My sensors are picking up a rather large anomaly headed in our direction_.”

 

Madelyn followed him inside a building, listening with her own strange electronic senses and finding what he was talking about. She didn’t have the Iron Legion’s ability to track different energy signatures, but she could wirelessly access traffic and security cameras, dozens of eyes opening to her at once and seeing something huge and reptilian tearing down the streets.

 

“Stegron,” she said, cross-referencing the visual profile with news reports over the past year, results coming to her in the time it took the average human to blink. “Jarvis, we have to – “

 

“ _Get you to safety_ ,” Jarvis said, and she shook her head.

 

“That’s what _I’m_ supposed to say,” she said, but even as she pulled him toward the exit that would lead away from the rampaging monster, she could already tell it was too late. The ground underneath them was shaking, like a small earthquake was going off. As Jarvis and Madelyn ran from the building, it shattered behind them with a thunderous roar.

 

Stegron was here.

 

“Jarvis fly up and try to find help!” Madelyn said.

 

“ _But I must protect you_ – “

 

“I am _not_ losing you, Jarvis!” Madelyn shouted at him, shoving him away. She didn’t try to manipulate his programming; she would never do such a thing, to change him on so fundamental a level. But she did let him see how desperate she was to keep him around, to make sure he didn’t go somewhere she couldn’t bring him back from. Madelyn could take refuge in the swirling labyrinth of networking around them, wait until she found a physical vessel that could handle her, but if Jarvis got crushed, that was it. There were no backups, no ways to beam him somewhere else to take cover. This made her…ache in ways that she wished she wasn’t programmed to, but she was, so she let him see it.

 

“ _Then…I shall go signal for help_ ,” Jarvis said, obviously unable to even comprehend the innumerable subroutines and syntaxes leading to her desperate need to keep him safe. All he could do was attempt to understand her the same way he attempted to understand Tony or Carol or Tadashi or Peter, or any of the other humans he’d come across.

 

Madelyn was…somewhere in between. A program, like him, but one that was complex enough, nuanced enough to be indistinguishable from a human brain. She felt bad, almost, for being what Jarvis had been meant to become, for passing him before she’d even entered the race. It was almost cheating.

 

When this was all over, she vowed, she would beg Tadashi to make another vessel like hers, to dump Jarvis into it and watch him grow into his new body, become like her.

 

And then they would get married or something.

 

Watching Jarvis fly away, she turned and glared at Stegron, who charged through the rubble of the building they’d been in and glowered down at her. He seemed even bigger than the news reports and footage from last time made him out to be. Maybe this was a new Stegron, or the old one had been given a few upgrades. Madelyn shifted, altering her density and tapping into Earth’s magnetic fields to float from the ground, glaring down at Stegron. He wanted to hurt Jarvis, and that wouldn’t stand.

 

“If you think you can just come through here and – “

 

_WHAP!_

 

A massive, beefy hand connected with her, and Madelyn felt her synthesized pain receptors screaming out. She quickly silenced them before the shock could reach her brain, flying to the ground and feeling the pavement tear beneath her as she skidded along. Any normal human being would be a smear, if not on the back of Stegron’s hand then on the pavement. Climbing to her feet, Madelyn was at least thankful that she had the beast’s attention.

 

Maybe she still had a lot to learn about fighting, but she was sturdy enough that such lessons didn’t cost her much more than wounded pride.

 

“Fine, then,” she said. “If that’s how you want to play, let’s go.”

 

“But not without backup from FREDZILLA!” a voice shouted, and a lanky blond figure wearing a teal beanie, a black t-shirt, and gray sweats tore past Madelyn, who watched, utterly dumbfounded as he sprouted spikes from his back, his skin turning from normal flesh into dark purple scales as he grew huge before her very eyes. In seconds, a monster about half the size of Stegron but no less imposing stood in front of the attacking beast. He looked like some kind of bipedal sea monster, with fish-like fins sprouting from his shoulders, back, and the long tail swishing behind him. His glowing yellow eyes fixed on Stegron, and he gave a screeching roar before charging forward.

 

“Fred, don’t just…ugh,” another, very familiar voice said, and Madelyn gasped as she turned to see a redhead floating down to a landing next to her. She had bright green eyes that peered curiously back at Madelyn, looking searchingly at her.

 

“Who…what are you?” Jean Grey asked, frowning a bit.

 

“I…I’m Madelyn,” she said, wincing as an explosion sounded in the background, followed by a guttural roar that sounded like raucous laughter. “I’m…Project Vision.”

 

“Oh my gosh…” Jean whispered. “But…but you weren’t supposed to….”

 

“ _There was a lot of ‘supposed to’ with Project Vision_ ,” another voice said, this one distorted by a vocal modulator, but Madelyn could easily wirelessly interface with the modulator and read every small change it was making, so when she heard the voice, it sounded perfectly normal, like Tadashi Hamada’s. The man himself landed near Jean, wearing a bulky suit of white armor that seemed to have a pretty basic onboard AI similar to the ones Tony Stark used in his. This one, though, was programmed to interface with his brainwaves, meaning that every thought of his was translated into a subtle movement in the armor, including a cannon that sprouted from his shoulder and idly tracked Stegron. “Seems like we were way off the mark, though.”

 

“She made herself a body,” Jean said. In the background, two more figures zoomed past and helped Fredzilla engage Stegron. A woman with wrist-mounted weapons of some sort was launching chemical mixtures at the creature, freezing its feet to the ground or shocking its skull. The other woman was zooming circles around the creature, never letting it lose focus on her, tossing some kind of hover disk at him when he started to aim at the other two.

 

They worked fairly well together.

 

“That she did,” Tadashi said, glancing back at Madelyn, the twin black eyes of his armor fixing on her. “Do you recognize us?”

 

“T…Tadashi and Jean,” she said. The closest approximation she had to a mother and father. Sure, Carol Danvers had been the map for her brain, but she felt more like a grandmother or an aunt or something. The two before had been almost completely responsible for her very existence. Still, there were more important things to worry about right now. “Um…Jarvis is…in danger.”

 

“ _I am here_ ,” Jarvis said, floating to a landing next to her, and Madelyn felt relief flood her synthesized brain as she saw him walk over to her side. “ _You told me to call for help, and so I did_.”

 

There was the damnable blush again. Cancelling the subroutines once more, Madelyn glanced between her “parents”.

 

“I-I don’t…Jarvis woke me up, and I just did what came naturally, I guess,” she said. “I-I made a b-body, and I saved him, and we just…looked for help.”

 

“This wasn’t really part of the plan,” Jean said, looking up at Tadashi. “She was supposed to be a supercomputer, not a…girl.”

 

“Well, she decided she wanted to be a girl,” Tadashi said with a shrug of his armor, and Madelyn felt her lips reflexively being pulled up in a smile at the warmth in his voice. “Can we really say no to that smile?”

 

Jean snorted and rolled her eyes, but she allowed a small smile at Madelyn.

 

“Well, I guess this is science, right?” she said with a shrug. “Plan for every possibility and still wind up surprised?”

 

“Hey, now you’re getting it,” Tadashi said, sounding proud of her. “The world’s a weird place. The second you think you’ve got it figured out, it proves you tremendously wrong.”

 

……

 

The smell of bacon was just…so wrong.

 

How could something forbidden by her very religion smell so…amazingly delicious!? Ugh. It wasn’t fair. Maybe just one bite wouldn’t hurt? But no…how could she face Abu and Ammi after making them worry about her for who knew how long this craziness would be a thing _and_ confess that she had had the audacity to eat pork? Even sitting here, smelling the cooking bacon, her mouth watering, aching to taste it, felt like she was committing some sort of atrocity that she would have to spend weeks working out with Sheikh Abdullah.

 

Ugh, being a superhero was supposed to be the hardest thing about her life, not being a Muslim in America.

 

“Uh…you alright?” Miles asked, looking her way as he turned a strip of bacon over in the skillet, and Kamala fixed him with a bright smile.

 

“Totally fine,” she said. “Not at all wishing for even a second that my religion didn’t forbid me from eating bacon, nope-nope.”

 

“Oh…” Miles said with a sheepish smile that was…okay, pretty cute. Miles had a habit of being cute that Kamala wasn’t too happy with, because he was definitely not the sort of boy that Abu and Ammi would appreciate her bringing home. “Um…well, what about beef? Steak and eggs?”

 

“Um…is the steak halal?” Kamala asked, smiling sheepishly. Why did her family have to be so strict about meat!? Miles was trying so hard!

 

“Okay, so…scrambled eggs?” Miles asked, scooping his bacon out of the skillet and setting it on some paper towels to cool off a bit. “Um…that’s…hella, right?”

 

Kamala giggled. “Halal,” she said, enunciating the syllables for him. “And…yeah, Ammi makes eggs for breakfast all the time. As long as they’re unfertilized.”  


“Ew, yeah,” Miles said. “That’s just, like…a given.” He made his way to the fridge, opening it up. Kamala was surprised that he even knew how to cook. He didn’t look much older than her, but then again, he came from a very different life. A much more lenient one, it seemed, where a kid was allowed to roam unsupervised for long enough to learn how to cook for himself and not rely on overly strict parents to dictate how life was supposed to be lived.

 

No, she couldn’t think that way. Abu and Ammi loved her very much. They were simply raising her in the best way they knew how. And Miles’s parents had raised him in the best way _they_ had known. As Miles looked up at her with a little smile, pulling out a carton of eggs, Kamala had to admit that they’d done a pretty good job.

 

“So, uh…I don’t know if kosher means anything to you, but these eggs are kosher, so…” he trailed off with a sheepish shrug.

 

“No, no, um…kosher and halal actually overlap a lot,” she said. “Really, as long as the egg isn’t fertilized, we’re good.”

 

“Are we actually talking about fertilizing eggs?” Ganke’s voice said on a yawn as he ambled into the kitchen of the Baxter Building. “Because that’s pretty weird breakfast conversation material, just gonna say.”

 

He made his way over to Kamala, climbing onto a stool next to her at the bar island in the middle of the room. The trio had made it to the Baxter Building well before anyone else, falling into bed almost as soon as they’d arrived. That had resulted in them being awake in the wee hours of the morning, while everyone else was still sleeping off a long day of crime-fighting, so Miles had taken control of the kitchen, citing many mornings on his own during the summer as a testament to his cooking skill.

 

He certainly knew how to cook up some bacon, and judging from the skillful way he was whisking up the entire dozen eggs in the carton, he could whip up a scramble, no problem.

 

“Kamala’s just making sure I don’t cook her something that’s gonna make, uh…Allah? Upset with her?” Miles asked, and Kamala snorted, nodding with what had to be her biggest smile.

 

He was just too cute!

 

“No, I think Allah appreciates you making sure I don’t eat the wrong thing,” she said. Ganke rolled his eyes at the pair, sliding right back off of his stool.

 

“I’ma take a shower and leave to two to your little flirt-fest,” he said. “Save me some eggs and bacon, yo.”

 

Miles glanced back at Kamala with a fearful look. “I-I wasn’t…I mean, I was just – “

 

“Miles,” Kamala said with a smile. “It’s fine. You’ve been super great.”

 

“Well, you’re Spider-Kid, after all,” Mile said with a smirk that just…melted Kamala’s poor little heart. She was way too young and way too impressionable to have to deal with this boy!

 

A ding came from the elevator, and the two looked over the bar counter that allowed a view into the living area as a tired figure stumbled out. He was wearing a black and blue uniform that marked him as Spider-Man, though his mask was off, and Kamala gasped at the realization.

 

She was looking at Spider-Man without his mask on.

 

And he looked…really tired.

 

“Peter – “

 

“Let’s save the reunion for about…half an hour, Miles,” Peter said, glancing at him with a long-suffering look. “I need a fucking shower.”

 

“Down that hall,” Miles said, pointing across the room to a hall that led toward the showers. Peter glanced down the hall, flashing Miles a grin.

 

“You’re the best,” he said, meandering down the hall.

 

“That was…Spider-Man,” Kamala breathed.

 

“Yep,” Miles said. “Peter Parker.”

 

“That’s his name?” Kamala asked, looking back at Miles, sure her eyes were the widest they’d ever been in her life. “What’s he like?”

 

Miles shrugged. “He’s just a normal dude trying to make the world a better place,” he said. “We’re all helping him.”

 

“He’s so young-looking,” Kamala voiced, and Miles nodded.

 

“He’s only fifteen,” he said. “I know, I expected him to be like thirty or something, but he’s not much older than us.”

 

“And he’s done all this,” Kamala said.

 

“Well, he’s had help,” Miles said. “Black Widow, the Wasp, Jackpot, Scarlet Spider, Dusk, even you and I. We’re all helping him, right?”

 

“Right,” Kamala said with a firm nod. She heard a ruckus behind her, and they both looked to see a cluster of about five girls hurrying in the direction Peter had gone, all of them chattering amongst themselves. They disappeared down the hallway, and moments later, Kamala heard indistinguishable shouting and a few muffled yells. “Is that normal?”

 

“The problem around here is that normal kinda just goes out the window the moment you sign on.”

 

……

 

I never signed up for this.

 

I mean, okay, being a superhero was never supposed to be easy, but I thought it would be something akin to a police officer or a firefighter. On call, but able to pursue a fairly normal life in the meantime.

 

This is feeling more like I jumped into the Marine Corps and got sent overseas for some demented tour of duty.

 

I just spent the night sleeping in an abandoned McDonald’s, enjoying a breakfast of hand-prepared McMuffins before parting ways with Illyana and Piotr outside the Baxter Building. The Sanctum Sanctorum wasn’t far, and the two were going to head there to check in with Dr. Strange, see if anything was amiss in the multiverse. Frankly, I’m happy to leave them to it.

 

Right now, all I really want is a shower. I feel grody, and I never use that word. I’m just pulling the top of my suit away when I hear the door the shower stall I picked slam open. I tense, knowing what’s next.

 

“Peter _Benjamin_ Parker!”

 

Yep. Middle name. Gwen’s pissed. I turn around, and there must be something in my expression, because Gwen’s furious (adorable) pout fades to a reluctantly concerned look. Behind her, the rest of my…girlfriends (I will never use the word harem with any amount of sincerity) cluster, Jess in the rear ushering the rest forward so she can shut the door behind them.

 

“Pete?” Kitty asks, making her way forward, followed by the rest of them, and I’m surrounded on all sides. I’m…all gross, in need of a shower, aching from sleeping on a greasy linoleum floor, and just…. I missed them. All of them. I open my arms, and Kitty, being the closest, steps forward, wrapping me in a hug. The rest cluster close, engulfing me in a five-way hug.

 

“I’m sorry I made you worry about me,” I say, and I hear five separate voices offer mixed placations, their voices mingling together in a soothing assurance that I haven’t made anyone mad, just concerned. Frankly, I was worried about each of them, too. I’m glad that all five of them are here to greet me. But that leaves a number of others unaccounted for. “Are the others…?”

 

“We’re all here,” Gwen hurries to say. “We’re all safe and sound. The building’s been…well, attacked a few times, but this place is about the safest in all of New York. We can hunker down here until we come up with a plan.”

 

“Yeah, a plan,” I say, nodding. “But…for now, I just seriously need a shower and an omelet.”

 

Gwen giggles. “Well, I’m sure Mayday already knows to let Harry know as soon as he wakes up that his best pal needs an omelet,” she says.

 

“In the meantime,” Jess says with a significant look at Gwen, who glances around at the rest of the girls. All of them give a nod, and I feel a strange sense of excited dread, if such a thing is possible.

 

I think this weird relationship setup is about to take a very important step forward.

 

“Why don’t uh…we help with that shower?” Lana asks, shooting me one of the sweetest smiles I’ve ever seen from her. The rest of the girls are all giving me similar looks, and…. Oh….

 

“Oh….”

 

“C’mon, Pete,” MJ says, coming up behind me and gently pushing me forward. “We were all really worried. And you obviously need to relax.”

 

Oh, boy.

 

……

 

“Oh…oh, boy! Isn’t it lovely, brother!”

 

This wasn’t supposed to happen. This wasn’t supposed to be how things turned out.

 

“I can seem them! The gears. The cogs and wheels turning in your head! You may have his plans, but you have _our_ brain, brother!”

 

Why did he call him that? Referring to him as his…his brother? He was Otto Octavius, not some simple-minded spider. He had copied his brainwaves perfectly! He was truly the superior Spider-Man! Saving the world from the shadows, not making a spectacle of himself. Truly, the city, the world benefited from a subtler touch, did it not?

 

“Oh…dear brother,” Kaine said, sounding maddeningly sympathetic. “You have been so…twisted, so misguided. You have only a desire to save the city, even if that desire clashes with…his….”

 

“How…dare you insinuate that I am not in control of my own mind!?” Otto shouted, watching as his six-armed creation sailed down toward him. Otto made to intercept him, to use his superhuman speed to stop Kaine, but Kaine had six arms, and while Otto had built himself some mechanical limbs in a back-mounted harness, they were still mechanical. They could interpret his thoughts and had a virtual intelligence that translated those thoughts into actions, but Kaine simply controlled his extra limbs as naturally as any arms. Six sets of webs shot toward Otto, binding the mechanical spider legs together in thick webbing. Kaine landed in front of him, and Otto leapt away, landing against the wall of his restaurant (really a cover for his machinations and a legitimate business front to endear him to the citizens) to crawl up the side. There was a tear as his robotic limbs ripped themselves free of the webbing, clicking against the side of the building and hoisting him up, freeing his arms and legs to grapple with Kaine, who collided with him. His spider-legs strained to keep him attached to the wall, but the force of the impact carried them away.

 

“Not so fast, Brother!” Kaine yelled as they sailed up and arced onto the roof of the restaurant. “I have something to show you!”

 

They both landed, rolling and breaking away from each other stand, but Kaine made no move to lunge for Otto or attack. Instead, he staggered back, on guard but passive for the moment. Otto didn’t take the moment to press the attack; they were just too evenly matched. He would bide his time until his backup arrived. Even now, the HUD in his goggles showed him the impending approach of his robot soldiers, blinking blue dots converging on his location.

 

“Waiting for your tin pets?” Kaine asked, grinning at him. “I wouldn’t hold my breath. You see, you’re not the only one with an army.”

 

His point was punctuated by the sudden blinking in his HUD as nearly half of the dots marking his soldiers began to flash red, indicating that they were under attack. Seconds later, the dots started disappearing, reporting catastrophic failure and shutdown as his numbers were nearly halved in only seconds.

 

“What have you done?” Otto asked, growling at Kaine. “What are you doing!?”

 

“I am freeing you, brother!” Kaine cackled, and Otto charged at him with a roar, his spider-legs reared back and ready to strike, but Kaine simply leapt away, landing against the scaffolding of the sign on top of the building. “I’m freeing the world from everyone who would pretend themselves its masters, and that includes the parasite living in your brain!”

 

“Parasite!?” Otto shouted, sneering. “The gall! I am no parasite; I am Otto Octavius! The Steel Spider! It is only through me that the world will be delivered to the next stage of existence! I will save all of New York from your rampage, and they will lift me upon their shoulders! I will – “

 

“He’s got his hooks in you deep,” Kaine cut him off, holding out all six arms, and that accursed lack of spider-sense when dealing with clones of Spider-Man was Otto’s undoing. He leapt away, but two webs caught his feet, sending him tumbling back to the rooftop. “Girls, we’ve got our work cut out for us.”  


Faster than Otto could react, his feet still bound by the webbing around his ankles, he thrashed briefly before his arms were webbed down, then the mechanical limbs that brandished themselves at Kaine. He was pinned, caught, a spider trapped in its own web.

 

“You’ll…pay for this insolence!” Otto screamed, straining against the webbing, but it was strong stuff. Kaine had obviously done his homework, testing the limits of their enhanced strength and making sure his webbing was strong enough to hold a Spider-Man. “I made you! I can just as easily unmake you!”

 

“Not if I unmake you, first,” Kaine said, leaning down with a smile that was equal parts victorious and sympathetic. “Worry not, Brother. We’re here to help.”

 

Otto briefly wondered who he was referring to when he said “we”, but the answer was made apparent moments later, when three girls peered down at him, standing around his head. They were all very nearly identical, with bright green eyes, flowing red hair, and matching curious expressions. They couldn’t be older than Otto’s own daughter, ten at the very most.

 

“Alright, my little mockingbirds,” Kaine said with a strange fondness in his voice, a hand coming up to pat each of them on the head. “Let’s fix Uncle Oliver, hm?”

 

“Do we hollow him out?” the girl in the middle asked, and Kaine shook his head.

 

“Remove everything associated with Otto Octavius,” he said. “I want to see what’s left behind.”

 

Well…this didn’t bode well.

 

……

 

“This isn’t looking good,” Fury said, looking out from the Avengers’ tower. The Avengers themselves were mostly scattered to the wind, helping New York recover from this disaster. “The more time goes on, the worse it gets.”

 

“Seems to me like most of these people were just looking for an excuse to riot,” Hill said from next to him, and he glanced back to see her with her arms folded crisply behind her back. “Sir.”  


“You’re not wrong,” Fury said. “Sad thing is, a lot of people are just…unhappy. Take away all the rules, leave ‘em room to make their own, this is what happens.”

 

“Add a dash of lottery-ticket superpowers, it doesn’t stop,” Hill added, moving to his side. “The moment we think we’ve gotten some ground back, another wildcard spitting fireballs shows up, and we’re back to square one.”

 

“And that, Director Fury, is why I’m here,” a gravelly voice said, and Fury had to turn back to the window under the pretense of scanning the street to control his expression. He’d heard that voice before, and it usually ended up spouting some damn military directive that he would have to do his best to execute to the fullest of his abilities and work around without being accused of treason.

 

“General Ross,” he said, turning back to the general, who was the very embodiment of the Army mentality. Tall, brawny, with a military buzz cut and a perfectly trimmed trapezoidal mustache adorning his upper lip, he was dressed in full military fatigues, his hat clutched behind his back. “I heard you might be dropping in on us.”

 

“Let’s not beat around the bush, Director,” Ross said, striding into the room. “You don’t want me here, and frankly, I’d rather not _be_ here. You’re the leader of this three-ring circus of a city, and the only reason I’m here is because the main attraction is a person-of-interest in a number of ongoing cases I’m dealing with.”

 

“You’re talking about Timothy Dugan,” Fury said, and Ross nodded.

 

“And it looks like he’s made himself a friend,” the General added, and Fury bristled at his tone.

 

“Bruce Banner – “

 

“Chose to stay uninvolved in your Avengers Initiative,” General Ross cut him off. “That means you have absolutely no say in how I pursue the Hulk or this…Yellow Hulk. How much headway have you made on that little tussle, anyhow?”

 

“We are currently attempting to contact Thor to intervene, but our usual lines of communication aren’t working,” Fury said. “Rest assured, the Avengers are ready to handle anything – “

 

“But you are _not_ handling it,” Ross told him. “The city is falling apart around your ears.”

 

“And what are _you_ doing about it?” Maria burst out, and Fury turned to glare at her while Ross snarled.

 

“Hill, that is enough,” Fury said calmly. “Go see if Coulson has sent us any updates.”

 

“Director – “

 

“Go,” Fury said, waiting until Maria had stepped briskly from the room before turning to Ross. “I apologize for my subordinate’s outburst. It’s been a stressful day for all of us.”

 

“To answer her completely out-of-line but no less pertinent question,” Ross said, his eyes glued on Fury, “I have already deployed troops to the holdouts you’ve told me about. In short order, we should have evac points set up, and we can start getting innocent civilians out of the line of fire. As for the…rioters. They will be deal with.”

 

“I’d rather not end this incident in a slaughter,” Fury said. “A lot of these people are scared, confused. They’re just dealing with what’s happening to them, and not everyone knows how to cope with suddenly having superpowers.”

 

“I’m not going to condone needless killing of American citizens,” Ross said sharply, almost sounding offended at Fury’s implication. “They will be given a chance to stand down. But if lethal force is necessary, it will be exercised. We don’t have time for your Avengers’ ‘save everyone’ mentality. If this is allowed to escalate, there won’t be anyone _left_ to save.”

 

“Then I’ll only remind you of the Neighborhood Watch – “

 

“Yeah, I got your little dossier on those…kids,” Ross said, waving an airy hand. “Punks like that should just stay in school, but if they wanna run around saving the world, I won’t stop ‘em. If they get in the way of my soldiers, though, they will be detained.”

 

At that, Fury actually let a small laugh, smiling up at the General.

 

“Good luck.”


	18. Chapter 18

Logan smelled fear.

 

In all his years (and there were a hell of a lot), he’d grown accustomed to the scent, the release of a thousand different chemicals that Hank could probably list off from memory telling anyone who was familiar with such things that someone was scared shitless. It was an aroma that flipped a lot of instinctual switches in the back of his head that he wasn’t proud of, but it was also helpful right about now. They tended to lose sight of Bruce Banner when he managed to extricate himself from his fight with Dugan, and Banner was pure fear, the terror of a creature that knew nothing but lashing out and running. Sure, they could get Jeannie to come in and look for the boiling pot of white-hot rage and fight-or-flight instinct, but she was busy with her other pals.

 

And Logan also didn’t want the kid anywhere near this fight. She could probably hold her own, but he didn’t want to test that theory. Not with her.

 

“Got him,” Logan growled.

 

“Where?” the Hulk asked in his guttural voice. Logan had never thought he’d see the day when he was working _with_ the green lug, but apparently, if your goals lined up with the Hulk’s, he made for a fierce ally.

 

“That way,” Logan said, and the Hulk leapt, soaring into the air and out of sight between the buildings of New York. Logan made a token effort to follow, but the Hulk had a tendency of -

 

“No!” Banner’s voice shouted, twisted by his own transformation, and the Yellow Hulk was suddenly flying along the street, spiraling into a direct collision with Logan before bouncing further along the pavement, Logan now hanging on for dear life as Banner rolled along.

 

Damn it, Dugan.

 

“Leave Bruce alone!” Yellow Hulk bellowed, skidding to a halt and tearing up long strips of pavement as he attempted to shake Logan loose, bucking like a bull. He was strong, strong enough that Logan probably would have dislocated a shoulder from the sheer effort of hanging on if he was any sort of normal person.

 

Logan was decidedly not normal.

 

_Snikt!_

 

“Nyargh!” Yellow Hulk shouted out as Logan sank his claws into the muscle and sinew of his shoulder, bracing himself as the yellow beast tried to shake him free.

 

“Bruce!” the Hulk yelled, and Logan shook, jarred to his reinforced bones as green collided with yellow with a force that shattered his eardrums, rendering him deaf for a few seconds as they healed up from the trauma. “…thing to be afraid of! The mist is gone!”

 

The Hulk tried to hang on, but Yellow Hulk shook him loose, hunching and charging the Hulk in a football tackle that dislodged Logan and sent him tumbling to the ground. Rolling to his feet, Logan crouched with his claws at the ready. Yellow Hulk was carrying his green counterpart down the street while the Hulk hammered at his shoulders, momentum the only thing keeping Dugan in the air before gravity took over, and Banner drove him into the ground, sending a spider web of cracks along the street, sidewalks, and even a few of the buildings.

 

“Leave Bruce alone!” Yellow Hulk bellowed once more. “Scared!”

 

“We’ve gotta get this guy somewhere he can calm down,” Logan muttered to himself.

 

“ _Maybe I can help with that_ ,” a modulated voice said, and with a roaring sound and a rush of warm air that whipped up a cloud of dust, a massive suit of Stark armor landed next to Logan, the ground shuddering as it stood. “ _Finally got in touch with the military, they were kind enough to loan me a heavy-duty satellite so I could get in touch with Veronica_.”

 

“Veronica?” Logan asked, looking up at the massive suit of armor. It was red and gold, like all of Stark’s flashy suits. They all seemed to have a color scheme, Stark, Danvers, Osborn, and Rhodes.

 

The Iron Family, they were unofficially called.

 

“ _Yeah, I was going for an Archie joke, but it kinda fell flat_ ,” Tony (it had to be Tony) said with a huge mechanical shrug. “ _Alright, so Dr. Banner needs a little R &R, place to calm down, relax, realign the chakras? Any thoughts_?”

 

“Well, a few hours north of here, there’s plenty of wilderness,” Logan said. “We can drag him up there, dump him in a lake, let him cool off.”

 

“ _Oh, and he’ll have a native to show him around, maybe be a charming Canadian tour guide_ ,” Tony said.

 

“Stark,” Logan growled.

 

“ _Ahoy there, eh_ ,” Tony went on. “ _How’s aboot we show ya ‘round this bush, eh_?”

 

“We’re gonna have words after this, bub,” Logan grumbled, brandishing his claws and hurrying at the Yellow Hulk. “Grab him and head north!”

 

“ _It is time for Dr. Banner’s vacation_!” Tony added, lumbering after him.

 

……

 

“I’m telling you, Pete, after this, we are dragging your ass to California for a proper vacation,” Jess says, her hand running over my chest. All of the girls have been pretty touchy-feely lately, apparently glad to have me back in the flesh after my New York safari. They’re also much more open about such things ever since our little moment in the shower that makes me wonder sometimes if the spider-bite didn’t just send me into some kind of fever dream, and I’m in a coma in the hospital right now.

 

The only flaw in that theory is that far too many people have died for this to be a fantasy.

 

And I could never have thought up someone like Edpool.

 

Speaking of which.

 

“ _Good morning, New York City_!” Edpool shouts from the TV, loud enough that he blows out a bit of the audio on his microphone. In the background is a news studio, obviously wrecked and abandoned in a hurry. A light fixture is swinging from one chain in the background, and the green screen behind him is showing various video clips of puppies and kittens frolicking in a constant slideshow. Edpool himself is sitting at the news desk, wearing a blue suit and red tie over his standard black crime-fighting outfit. “ _Wow, hell of a day out there, huh? This is Edpool, coming to you live from, uh…what station are we in_!?”

 

From off camera, a slightly whiny voice shouts back. “ _I dunno, Channel Seven? I think it’s seven! Do I have to wear this outfit –_ “

 

“ _Put it on_!” Edpool yells, turning back to camera. “ _Coming to you live from Channel Seven’s news studio, which is looking a bit post-apocalyptic, if you ask me. Bit of a_ Walking Dead _vibe with some Fallout 4 creepiness. Now, I know it’s a big scary commotion going on right now, so I’ve decided to do my part and make sure everyone is up to speed on what’s going on in the extra-mean streets of New York City! To help with that, I’d like to introduce…Spider-Dan_!”

 

He gestures toward the left side of the screen, and there’s a couple seconds of silence.

 

“ _Is that my_ – “

 

“ _Yes_!” Edpool shouts, and a man staggers hurriedly on screen. He’s tall and lanky, and he’s wearing…is that my old suit!? No, my suit wouldn’t fit someone that tall. Still, Edpool’s gone to great lengths to mimic my “beta” design, the one I used after we stopped being parkour spider-kids.

 

Weird, kinda.

 

“ _Ladies and gentleman, Spider-Dan is going to be our eye on the streets, reporting back here with anything spoopy or dangerous that’ll hurt the citizens of New York_!” Edpool goes on. “ _Starting…now_!”

 

At that, he lifts Spider-Dan and throws him off-screen. There’s the distant sound of glass shattering, and Edpool taps a few buttons on a console in front of him.

 

“ _Now, let’s see what Spider-Dan is seeing_!” he says.

 

Abruptly, the screen changes, and we’re treated to a view of the street outside of the Channel 7 studio very rapidly approaching, the occasional hand flailing into view. The only reason I think we can’t hear Spider-Dan’s panicked screams is because of the air rushing past the camera. Seconds before impact, the screen switches back to Edpool, sitting primly at his desk.

 

“ _Well, we’ll give Spider-Dan some time to settle into his new role, and until then, we’ll be accepting your calls at_ – “

 

The sound is suddenly muted, and the remote flies into view, tossed by Harry as he strides around the couch with Johnny in tow.

 

“Harry, what – “

 

“Town meeting!” Harry calls. “Neighborhood Watch, gather!”

 

“We have town meetings now?” I ask, and Harry nods vigorously.

 

“We so fucking do!” he says, standing proudly in front of the TV. Behind him, Johnny fiddles with something on the display, and Edpool disappears to reveal some kind of flowchart. “C’mon, guys, bring it in!”

 

The girls are gathered around me on a couch in the Baxter Building’s living area, Jess leaning against one side while Lana takes the other (she worries), leaving the rest to sort of cluster around me. The other members of the Watch slowly trickle into the room, taking seats or just standing near the windows. I see the new girl, Kamala (I made her recite her name five times until I committed it to memory), stand awkwardly at the entrance before Ganke and Miles take an arm each and pull her toward a loveseat near the window. Miles sits, pulling Kamala down next to him, and Ganke takes the arm on Kamala’s other side.

 

Already, I see shades of Harry, Gwen, and I.

 

“Alright!” Harry says as the rest of the Watch gathers, and wow, there are a lot of us. We outnumber the Avengers, I think. Of course, we’re just a bunch of kids (and a clone of myself with a somewhat ambiguous age), so I don’t think we’re about to usurp them at any point. Still, it’s nice to know that there are so many people involved in keeping New York crime-free. The city sometimes feels like the epicenter of super-related crimes, like all of the most ambitious villains find their way here to try…something.

 

Like now. Of course, the villain in question in this case is another clone of me. Does that mean that _I’m_ just one bad day away from wreaking such chaos? I mean, Kaine is just my brain with a different set of life experiences. One could argue that he’s only so unstable because he doesn’t have any sort of childhood or upbringing to draw from, just his own sudden existence. Suddenly _being_ would probably be overwhelming to most.

 

Even so, he has my brain. If my brain, sans any memories, had been dropped in the middle of New York with spider powers and a few extra limbs, would I really just go full misguided antihero-cum-supervillain?

 

“Whatcha thinking about?” Lana asks softly into my ear while Harry assembles the others.

 

“Just…nothing much,” I say, and Lana rolls her eyes.

 

“The day Peter Parker isn’t thinking about much is the day the world doesn’t have anything to worry about,” she says. “Talk.”

 

“Just…Kaine,” I say, sighing, and she nods, squeezing my arm.

 

What did I do to deserve five understanding girlfriends? Even as I talk to Lana, I can tell the others are just listening silently, their eyes darting to me as often as they track Harry and Johnny working out some kind of presentation they’re planning.

 

“What about him?” Lana asks.

 

“He’s…me,” I say. “He’s me, but without my memories. I mean…my brain is fully capable of going full supervillain. I’m…just not sure how I feel about that.”

 

“Peter, that’s…dumb,” Lana says, shaking her head. “ _Anyone_ could go supervillain. I mean…without you in my life, _I_ probably would have. But I had you. And you had…well, your Uncle Ben and Aunt May. And they had…whoever raised them. I bet if we went out and cloned…Gwen or Jess or…Captain fucking America himself and tossed them out into the world, it’s a fifty-fifty shot they’ll go bad. But there are good people out there. And those good people make more good people, and…well, you get it. So all you can do is be good. Be good, and you’ll make more good people, and they’ll make more, and the world will just become a better place. Right? That’s what this is about, right? Showing the world that being good feels good?”

 

I’m actually speechless for a moment; I really had an effect on Lana. “Um…yeah, I guess you’re right,” I say, and Lana nods.

 

“You fuckin’ know it,” she says with a sardonic smirk. I chuckle a bit, and the rest of the girls all shift with laughter around me.

 

“You’re pretty great, Lana,” I tell her, and she pouts a bit, ducking into my side.

 

“Yeah, don’t let anyone else know,” she mutters into my shoulder. I just squeeze her with my arm, and she snuggles into my side as Harry gestures at the TV screen. Johnny taps a few buttons on the remote, and suddenly, there’s a holographic display filling the entire room. At first glance, it looks like the flowchart from before, rendered in stunning three-dimensional augmented reality.

 

“Okay!” Harry says, commanding the attention of the room. “So, for those of you who aren’t up to speed, this is the official info-dump. Johnny and I have been, um…compiling? Compiling the information from everyone into a sort of timeline, because if you’re like me, you probably have no actual fucking clue what’s really going on. So, here we go.”

 

“A few months ago,” Johnny says, tapping the remote, and the holographic display shows a dot zooming along the timeline to the very beginning, “Peter Parker was kidnapped by the Superior Six, and a lot of people were really worried at the time. If I’d known you, Pete, I’da been worried, too.”  


“I know you would have,” I say, and a chorus of laughter ripples throughout the room.

 

“So, Pete was kidnapped because Otto Octavius wanted his DNA to make a clone,” Harry says, continuing the presentation, and with a tap on the remote, the dot zooms along a bit. “He wanted to clone Pete and grow a body so he could stuff his brain in the body and use it to become some kind of…better Spider-Man.”  


“A Superior Spider-Man,” my other clone says from nearby. Spidercide, he calls himself. He hasn’t picked any sort of civilian name, but it’s hardly a concern right now. “He wanted to show the world what someone with your powers could accomplish. As if he could do better than you. A pretender, a usurper, a contender, deserter.”

 

“Yeah, that,” Johnny says with a flippant shake of his head. “So, Otto Octavius stuck his brainwaves in a cloned body of Pete and just dumped the rest. But…well, some of those clones weren’t ready to be dumped.”

 

“And…one of us woke up thinking…she…was Peter Parker,” Riley cuts in. The room’s attention turns to her, and Julie places a hand on her arm from next to her. Johnny and Harry stop their presentation for a moment, stunned to silence by the sudden interruption.

 

“Riley,” Julie says softly, and Riley shakes her head.

 

“We need to have this all out in the open,” she insists, looking up and gazing out at everyone as though daring them to find an issue with what she says. “Since we’re doing kind of a full disclosure, I’m just gonna kinda come out with it. I woke up a few months ago in Doc Ock’s cloning facility thinking I was Peter Parker. I had all of his memories up until the moment I woke up. I…I thought I was him. I thought…I was just having a bad day.

 

“I found out later that I was…just a failed clone. Ock didn’t want to be a girl, I guess. I can sympathize. But somewhere along the line, I got the full package of memories, and they’re still there. We’re still not totally sure how, but that’s how it is. So…if I’ve acted weird around anyone, or if I _do_ act weird, I just…I’m still settling in. It’ll take a while, but that’s just…. I needed to vent. I’m sorry.”

 

“Don’t you apologize,” Gwen says from her spot on the couch, standing and heading over to wrap Riley in a hug. “Don’t you dare. You have no room to be sorry for anything. We’re all just trying to work things out, and you have an extra bit of craziness to settle. So…we’re here for you. We haven’t been, but we will be. Okay?”

 

Riley’s quiet for a moment, and I feel Jess squeeze my arm, leaning in to whisper in my ear.

 

“She’s…you?” she asks. “You, but a girl?”

 

“Yeah,” I say, and Jess takes a small, sharp breath. “She didn’t wanna make a fuss about it.”

 

“You wouldn’t,” Jess mutters wryly, huffing softly. “But…that doesn’t seem fair. She doesn’t get to be Peter Parker at all.”

 

“We’re working it out,” Gwen says, settling back in onto the couch. “We’re gonna have a nice talk after all of this, right, Pete?”

 

“We gotta,” I say. “I…I’d keep a brave face, but…hell, I’d make it a few months before I’d miss every one of you. Weird…polyamory setup or no.”

 

“Aw, that’s kinda sweet,” Kitty says from past Lana, reaching over to squeeze my hand. The others spend another moment focused on Riley before they turn their attention back to Harry and Johnny.

 

“Alright, so clone angst aside, and I’m not dismissing this,” Harry says with a significant look at Riley, who just smiles back. “We’re gonna address all this crazy shit later when New York is saved. But…we kinda have to fix this first.”

 

“No, I’m not trying to steal your attention away,” Riley says, gesturing to Harry. “Go on.”

 

“One of Ock’s clones went and decided that the best thing to do was to bomb New York with some kind of gas that gave people superpowers,” Johnny says. “Like…very certain people. Genetic Lottery kinda stuff, where if you have alien-altered DNA like a thousand generations up, hey, superpowers.”

 

“Abu and Ammi are not going to like hearing that we’re descended from alien experiments,” Kamala mutters. Miles just reaches over and pats her on the shoulder, and she reaches up to grip his hand, smiling at him.

 

“And that’s where we are,” Harry says. “We need to stop this crazy Pete-clone, and we need to do it quick, before he manages to get his hooks into the city. He’s trying, and if we can’t stop him, New York is fucked.”  
  
“More fucked than usual,” Cindy adds, standing on Riley’s left side while Julie clings to my clone’s right. Cindy seems to have really taken a liking to Riley ever since my female counterpart made a call to Tony and put in a good word for Cindy’s little brother, securing a new set of cybernetic legs for him.

 

I could’ve done the same thing, but frankly, I’m not really in the mood to be jealous of something I frankly have no business being jealous over. Cindy was in a bad place and Riley helped her out of it, full stop. I have enough going on with my five girls.

 

 I can’t believe I just pondered that to myself.

 

“So, what’s been going on while we were separated?” I ask the room, and Bobby raises his hand.

 

“J. J. Jameson is like our best friend now,” he says. “We saved his skin from some woman with, like…kaboomin’ hands, like Lana has.”

 

Lana tenses against me, perking up and glancing over at him. “Dark brown hair and blue eyes, kinda on the scrawny side?” she asks, and I give her a squeeze as Bobby nods.

 

“Oh, wait…” he says, his eyes suddenly going wide. “Oh, that was…um…. Sorry, Lana.”

 

“No, it’s fine,” Lana grumbles. “Mass prison breaks, Mom was in jail, I should’ve…probably thought about that sooner. And now she has her powers, probably thanks to that mist.”

 

“We won’t let her get you,” I tell her, and Lana just smirks up at me, pulling her feet up onto the couch and leaning even more heavily against me.

 

“Love you,” she whispers into my ear, and I smile as she drops her head onto my shoulder. I lower mine onto hers, and it’s a full four seconds before I remember that we’re basically cuddling in front of literally every single one of my friends.

 

That’s potentially a problem.

 

“So…should we be – “

 

“No,” Gwen cuts smoothly across Johnny’s question. “You shouldn’t be much of anything about this, okay? It’s something we’re doing, and we’re all on the same page about it.”

 

“Perfectly healthy,” Kitty adds.

 

“Totally normal and under control,” Jess tacks on.

 

“Nothing to worry about,” MJ says with cold finality in her tone as she reaches over and takes Lana’s hand, which has been edging away from mine. She grips Lana’s wrist, tugging it over and pressing her palm into the back of my hand. I twist my wrist and curl her fingers into mine. I can feel Lana relax against me, letting silent laugh.

 

“I think we just came out to the group,” she whispers into my ear.

 

“I’m not even ready to think about that,” I tell her, and she shudders against me with laughter. The others in the room share a look that tells me there are a lot of unspoken conversations going on. A lot of those seem to land in the “leave well-enough alone” camp, as no one says anything that threatens to unseat the general peace permeating the Watch. Harry, though, seems particularly invested in this new development, judging from the look he’s giving me, a mixture of shock and incredulity but also mild concern.

 

“Pete,” he says, glancing at the girls around me before giving me a wide-eyed look. “This is…okay, right? If you’re dealing with, like…spider-babies, I can help out – “

 

“No,” I insist, feeling my face heat up as I vigorously shake my head. The concept of “spider-babies” is years away, I hope. Sure, we’ve…well, let’s face it, we’ve seen each other naked, courtesy of the shower that’s going to be burned into my memory for years. But that’s just like step one. Or even step half. There are about four more steps (maybe, probably, God I hope so) until we have to consider the possibility of “spider-babies”.

 

And also like a thousand more years.

 

“No, that’s not a…a concern right now.”

 

Harry just nods solemnly, folding his arms over his chest.

 

“If anything comes up,” he tells me, “you just let me know. We’re pretty much brothers, so, like…money’s nothing to worry about.”

 

“Okay,” I say quickly, hoping to politely cut off _any_ more discussion about this. “Um…thanks, Harry, I’ll remember that.”

 

I can feel the whole couch shaking with the quiet laughter of the girls, and I just try to control the heat rising in my face. This is _not_ what I had in mind for this meeting. Instead of catching up on matters of the city, it seems to be a full-disclosure of the various dark secrets of the Watch. Next, Harry’s going to be telling me that Jubilee is pregnant or something.

 

“Alright, crazy personal drama aside,” Harry says, glancing around at everyone else, “because that shit is crazy but totally not important right now, there is one more thing we need to talk about.”

 

Oh, hell. _Is_ Jubilee pregnant?

 

“The goblins,” Julie says with a glance between Harry and Jubilee. Harry just nods. “The ones that burned down your place.”

 

“Wait, you saw them too?” MJ pipes in, and the rest of us all glance at her. “Cindy and I saw these guys while we were out, and…well, they sure looked like goblins.”

 

“Green skin, yellow eyes?” Harry asks. “A bigger one that shoots like fire plasma shit?”

 

“Yeah,” Cindy says darkly, and Riley leans against her, rubbing her back. “Yeah, we ran into them, too. Four of them. Called themselves the Frightful Four. They’re the ones that…that got Al.”

 

“But you saved him,” Riley reminds her, and Cindy snickers a bit, nodding.

 

“I don’t know how I didn’t notice you were a female Pete before,” she says. “You’re both just…so sweet, I wanna punch you.”

 

Riley smirks a bit, and Cindy ruffles her hair as Julie watches, looking only slightly put out before Riley reaches over and squeezes her hand.

 

Jeez, maybe it’s appropriate that we’re mostly spider-themed, because there’s some kind of romantic web weaving itself between quite a lot of us.

 

“Alright, anyway,” Harry says, and I silently thank him for staying on topic and directing things away from that creeping Dawson’s Creek feeling that I hoped passed a while ago, “the goblins are pissed at…well, me.”

 

“You?” Riley and I ask at the same time, glancing at each other before Riley speaks.

 

“Why you?” she asks.

 

“Bo fucking clue,” Harry says with a shrug. “But he’s way into me in the worst way.”

 

“Like…the Wasp?” I ask, and Harry shakes his head.

 

“As in me, Harry Osborn,” he says. “He’s got a serious hate-boner for me. And I don’t know why. But it’s something we should probably be worried about, because if he’s into me, he’s gonna probably come after you guys.”

 

“Well, good thing every single one of us has some kind of superpower,” Cindy says with a shrug. “Like…even your dad has a giant-ass suit of armor and armored pals to cover his ass until he can get into it. Whoever this goblin guy is, he fucked with the wrong rich boy.”

 

Harry snickers. “Good point.”

 

“But that also brings up the matter of how these guys know you, Harry Osborn,” I say. “People can be pissed at the Wasp, but if they’re pissed at you, we need to think about it.”

 

“I got no clue, mate,” Harry said with a shake of his head. “I mean, okay, I’ve pissed off a few people, but I don’t think I’ve gone full ‘supervillain origin story’ on any of them.”

 

“Okay, so we keep an eye for these goblins, and everyone make sure to pay attention,” I say. “See if you can catch anything that might give us a clue as to who they actually are. And in the meantime, we do everything we can to help.”

 

“Because we gotta save this whole fucking city,” Harry says with a grin, and I nod.

 

“Damn right,” I say. “Whatever you can do. I don’t care if you’re saving one little old lady or rescuing a whole bank of hostages. If you can do a good deed, do it. The Avengers are keeping tabs on the big picture, and we’re doing what we can to help. The name of the game is evacuation. We find people, we get them to the military or the police, we let them take it from there. We can handle the craziness they can’t, and we can get the normies _out_ of the craziness and help them. We’re the lifeline. We’re the ones that can wade into this and help people. So we’re gonna do it.”

 

“And if the goblins show up again?” MJ asks, and I glance over at her to see her looking worriedly back.

 

“We’re not dealing with thugs or muggers or purse-snatchers,” Riley admits just as I ponder the same fact. This isn’t New York as we know it. This is New York in a state of utter panic. Common criminals are now the uncommon ones. We have to assume that everyone looking to cause a ruckus has the superpowers to back up said ruckus. And we have to plan accordingly.

 

“Large groups,” Riley and I say at the same time, and I meet eyes with her, giving her a little nod.

 

“Five or six to a group,” she says. “We’re going for quality of each group, not quantity of groups. If we’re just three sets of five or so, that’s better than a bunch of smaller parties. This is a new game. The bad guys are potentially just as powerful as us, so we have to stick together. Pete?”

 

“I hate to say this,” I say, “but…my, uh…girls, on me. Gwen, Lana, Kitty, MJ, and Jess, we’re gonna be one patrol.”

 

“Julie, Cindy, Harry, Jubilee, Johnny, all of you on me,” Riley says.

 

“And Flash, Bobby, Kamala, Miles, Ganke, Mayday, and uh…clone-me?”

 

“Marion,” Spidercide says, apparently coming up with a name on the spot. “Marion Richards. Our dear parents’ names, yes?”

 

“You know, that works,” I say, and Spidercide, or…Marion…grins at me. It’s like looking into a mirror, but in some kind of Halloween funhouse. His hair hangs to his chin, and he has the beginnings of a stubble, but otherwise, he looks just like me. It’s…unnerving. He seems to sense this, though, probably guessing my thoughts because they’re similar to his, and he looks away, staring out the window.

 

“We’re going to save the city, yes?” he asks. “Towers built, towers fought, battles won, justice bought.”

 

“Johnny, do you have a stable communications array working yet?” Riley asks, and Johnny nods, staring at Riley for a long moment. I can almost see the gears turning in his head. Johnny has made no secret of his “bro-crush” on me, and now there’s a girl that’s basically my brain in a female body. Suddenly, there’s no “bro” to it and just crush. Riley seems to be thinking the same thing (obviously), and sighs.

 

“Um, yeah,” Johnny says, obviously not wanting to make things awkward. “Yeah, we’ll be able to communicate, no problem.”

 

“We should check in every half hour or so,” Riley says, glancing at me, and I nod.

 

“And meet back here in three hours,” I add. “Play it safe. Go out, do good, but we come back and regroup, trade information. If we’re gonna actually help end this, we need to gather intel, be mini Avengers. Above all, we need to find Kaine. He’s obviously got plans for the city and probably some kind of world domination thing in mind, so we need to stop him. Look out for the goblins, and above all, stay together.”

 

Riley nods while next to me, Gwen jumps and reaches into her pocket, producing her phone. She swipes and places it to her ear.

 

“Hello?” she asks, gasping seconds later. “Daddy? …H-hey! …Um, no, I’m fine, we’re all fine, we’re at the Baxter Building.”  


She stands and meanders from the room toward the kitchen, and I feel a nudge from…well, from everyone. I look around and see the other four girls all giving me significant looks, and Lana points toward Gwen. Getting the (overt) message, and stand and follow.

 

“…been just trying to regroup, but we’re all here, and we’re about to head back out,” Gwen is saying as I enter the kitchen. “…It’s okay, we’re staying in groups. Big groups, like…six each. We’re gonna watch each other’s backs and try to do some good. …Yes, Dad, Peter’s in my group. …Of course. Dad, he’s literally taken a bullet for me, do you think he’ll let me get hurt? I’m gonna be watching _his_ ass.”

 

Aw, Gwen….

 

“…Really? What’s he like?” Gwen asks. “…Aw, I’m glad you got to know him and talk to him and stuff. And I’m glad you have Captain America to look out for you. …Daddy, I have superpowers and like a hundred friends with superpowers. I’m safe. I’m just worried about you. You’re always so worried about everyone else, you never really look after yourself. …Really? Is he right there? …Can you put him on?”

 

She waits for a moment, spotting me and smiling. Making her way over, she nestles against me, pressing her slim form against mine and giving me a soft little kiss. Tucking her head under my chin, she tenses for a moment.

 

“Hello? Um…Captain?” she asks, pausing for a moment. “Oh, okay, um…Wade. This is Gwen Stacy, George’s daughter? …Oh, um…nice to meet you, too. Um…listen, my dad is…well, he’s a good man, but he’s a bit too good sometimes. He feels like…. Oh my gosh, that’s it. So, if you could…. Exactly! …Thank you so much, Cap—uh, Wade. …Yeah! Yeah, Black Widow. …Mhm, he’s right here. …I’ll let him know. And thanks again for looking out for my dad. …Good luck. …No, no, just tell him I told him to be careful. …Mhm, you, too. Bye.”

 

She sighs, pocketing her phone and looking up at me, leaning back against me to settle into my arms.

 

“Captain America says hi,” she says. “And he’s a big fan.”

 

“I’m…actually more than a bit flattered,” I admit, and Gwen giggles, nestling against me.

 

“Mmm, he’s gonna look after Dad,” she says, reaching up to wipe a tear from her cheek, and I squeeze her tighter. “I…feel way better knowing that. Seriously, all Dad ever wants to do is save everyone else, and like…if he gets hurt, oh well, I guess. You two are so much alike.”

 

“That is not…” I trail off, sighing. “Okay, that’s exactly how I am, but you make it sound like a bad thing.”

 

“It is!” Gwen insists with a rueful smile, reaching up to trail her fingers down my jaw. “It’s a…mixed thing. It’s heroic, but I just…worry my ass off when you get all self-sacrificing.”

 

“Oh, don’t worry your ass off,” I tell her, shaking my head. “That thing’s a work of art.”

 

“Oh my God, you are you such a perv!” Gwen giggles, and I snicker, leaning down to kiss her nose, and she hums softly, moving to plant a soft kiss on my lips. “Is it okay if we maybe just stay in here for a bit? I’m completely okay with sharing you, but right now, I kinda like having you to myself.”

 

“You’re the one in charge of this whole setup,” I tell her. “I literally can’t complain.”

 

“I know, right?” Gwen snickers. “Like…there are five girls that are just sharing you. You complain, you’re like…ungrateful or something.”

 

“Speaking of,” I say, “we kinda outed ourselves.”

 

“Yeah,” she sighs, slumping against me. “I mean, it had to happen eventually, but I wasn’t really planning on it going down in the middle of all this. I hope it doesn’t distract anyone too much.”

 

“If there’s one thing the Watch is good at, it’s focusing up when we have to,” I insist. “We’ll be alright. Plus, it’ll be me and you guys all in one group, so no one else can see us and like…ponder.”

 

“Wondering how far you’ve gone with all of us,” Gwen says. “Do we make out with you like one at a time or all at once, what’s the setup for cuddling? Is there a schedule, or do we just go by how it feels?”

 

“The polyamory struggle is real,” I say, and Gwen smirks, kissing my chin. I wrap my arms around her, giving her a little squeeze. “Do you ever miss, like…just us? You and me?”

 

“Once in a while,” she says after a short pause. “I think of how nice it was, how simple we had it. But…it didn’t feel fair. If Jess hadn’t moved away, you guys would still have been dating, and…well, I would’ve been the one having to watch you two be happy while I…missed you. And then, MJ obviously cared about you a ton, and you really helped her with her whole identity crisis thing, so…. I mean, I felt bad, having you all to myself when…when you’ve had such a profound effect on all of these girls, and…your life has been just…unfair. All you do is try to help. That’s literally all you’ve been trying to do for like six months. But life just won’t stop shitting on you, Pete. So if I can make things just a bit brighter by making sure you’re able to enjoy some guilt-free affection from all of the girls that just love you to bits, I will.”

 

“And now you wanna get Riley in on it,” I say, and Gwen shrugs, smiling sheepishly up at me.

 

“Is it that obvious?” she asks.

 

“You’re good at reading me,” I tell her, “but that goes both ways.”

 

“Hmph,” Gwen pouts, hunching her shoulders. “Well…would that be so bad? I mean, you can sympathize with Riley more than any of us.”

 

“She misses you,” I tell her. “She didn’t get to have this setup with us, but she misses you, I know. And now that she knows the….”

 

“The harem?” Gwen suggests wryly, and I roll my eyes.

 

“I’m not calling it that,” I say. “That feels like you’re just…a collection.”

 

“Aw, Pete,” Gwen says with a smile, planting another kiss on my chin. “Well, now that Riley knows about this thing we have….”

 

“She’s gonna feel…left out,” I say. “She won’t wanna make a fuss, and she will definitely _not_ wanna paint herself as a victim, but she’ll feel like it.”

 

At the very least, this whole thing where Riley has all of my memories up until the point she “awoke” is handy in that I can fairly accurately guess her feelings.

 

“I know,” Gwen says, sighing. “She’s…well, just like you. I mean, she _is_ you, to some degree. I just don’t want you to feel…jealous or anything.”

 

“Gwen, I have five girls that all agreed I was worth sharing,” I tell her. “I don’t have any right to be jealous. If you…wanna help Riley once in a while, I’m completely okay with that.”

 

“Are you sure?” Gwen asks, staring up at me with those silvery blue eyes that captured my attention from the moment I first saw them almost a decade ago.

 

“I’ll…it’ll be weird at first,” I admit, “but Riley remembers being me, and well…I’d hate to have to say goodbye to you. That would just be the worst.”

 

“Aw,” Gwen giggles, leaning in to plant another soft kiss to my lips. “You’re too fucking cute, stop it.”

 

“You first,” I say, and she snickers, nuzzling against me.

 

“Remember when we first met?” she asks. “With the sidewalk chalk?”

 

“And you were going full art critic on my cat drawing?” I ask her, and she snickers as I give her a squeeze. “I’m still salty about that.”

 

“I’m sorry!” she giggles. “I just wanted to be friends, and I was trying to help you be a better artist!”

 

“You dashed my dreams that day,” I say with a solemn shake of my head. “I never recovered after that.”

 

“No, you can’t do thaaat,” she whines, and shaking her head against me. “I’ll feel so bad.”

 

“Alright, fine, you inspired me to pursue different artistic paths, and now I’m a badass photographer and superhero,” I tell her. She smiles up at me, obviously pleased with my response.

 

“Did you know, way back then, I already had a little crush on you?” Gwen asks, and I shake my head.

 

“You did not,” I insist, and she pouts at me.

 

“No, I totally did!” she says. “I just didn’t know how to deal with it, so I just told myself like ‘I just really wanna be best pals with him!’”

 

“We were both just kinda really dumb about romantic stuff back then,” I surmise, and Gwen nods against me.

 

“Complete idiots,” she agrees. “But, like…maybe it was for the best. I mean, we’ve got a pretty good deal doing on right now.”

 

“Aunt May always said everything happens for a reason,” I point out. “I used to kinda just shake my head, but maybe she was onto something.”

 

Gwen wiggles around in my arms and hugs me tightly, sighing and nuzzling into my chest. The scent of her shampoo wafts up to me, and the slim, warm feel of her body against mine is just…great.

 

“Some of the stuff that’s happened to you just doesn’t seem fair, though,” she murmurs into my chest. I just shake my head, sighing and resting my chin against her hair.

 

“I can’t start thinking about what’s fair and what’s not,” I say. “If I start thinking about…about what life’s taken from me, I start wondering what I’ll get in return. But…that’s that problem. Life isn’t…fair. It’s a cliché, but it’s true. Life is just a bunch of stuff happening to people, and we can only hope to prepare for the worst it has to offer us. We make it through, we look back, and we dust ourselves off. If I look at it that way, I can move forward and do my best to make sure that other people won’t have to deal with what I’ve had to.”

 

“Pete…” Gwen sighs into my shirt, her breath puffing hotly against my chest before I feel a cool sensation as the air hits it again.

 

“I just don’t wanna become some guy that feels like there has to always be someone to blame,” I say. “Aunt May is—gone. And the people that took her from me have…well, learned their lesson. But I can’t go on thinking the whole world has to, like…pay for what happened. I’m gonna keep going out there, and I’m gonna keep trying to make the city, the world a better place. But I’m gonna do it for them, not for me. If this becomes about me, I’m not a hero. I’m just some…some guy looking to get revenge on a world that never did anything wrong to him.”

 

“That just sounds awful.”

 

……

 

Good, his stash was still here. That was wonderful.

 

Frank dug into the room hidden behind the closet of his mom’s old place. People didn’t connect the old Castiglione name with the name Castle these days. Clearly, his attempts at subterfuge had worked, or the Marine recruiter he’d fed his fake name to just didn’t care enough to do a background check. It was all about numbers with those types. Get enough wide-eyed patriots to sign up, especially at the end of the month, and all that mattered to them was that sweet paycheck.

 

Bastards.

 

In any case, it worked in his favor this time. He snagged up his cache, attaching pistols, rifles, semi-automatics, and one fully-automatic rifle to the harness he wrapped around himself. He had enough ammo to survive the apocalypse, and though a lot of people wanted to pretend that that was what was happening right now, he knew this was just New York dealing with another disaster at the hands of people that thought they could scare the citizens into cooperation.

 

Hell, they probably could, in most cases. But he was gonna scare _them_. He would give them a taste of what they thought they were offering up to others, but so much more potent.

 

Or, that’s what he’d thought. As Frank turned to exit his old home, a thunderous crash sounded, and suddenly, there was no roof blocking him from the early-morning sun beating down on the city. He looked up, his eyes widening at what he saw. No, no way things had gotten _this_ out of whack. No way mankind had departed so thoroughly from what it was capable of. But, when he thought about it, there people out there capable of wreathing themselves in fire, of shooting deadly amounts of electricity from their own hands.

 

Why wouldn’t someone be able to grow to enormous proportions?

 

Remembering all too clearly the tales of David and Goliath his mom used to regale him with in his youth, Frank dove away as a giant foot smashed what remained of his childhood home. He scrambled to his feet and took off down the sidewalk outside of the Castiglione household, looking behind him to see a man dressed up in some kind of lightweight body armor currently tearing his old neighborhood apart. It might have seemed comical, one person attempting to rip apart a New York City street, if that person wasn’t a good fifty feet tall and looking like he was taking just a bit too much pleasure in the destruction he was wreaking.

 

“You’re all so small!” the man’s voice shouted, booming loudly and rattling Frank to his bones. “Look at you! You’re like ants!”

 

Helicopters buzzed around the giant man’s head, and he snarled, batting at them like they were nothing more than irritating bugs, gnats circling in front of his face.

 

“ _Blonsky_!” a voice shouted from one of the choppers, amplified by a megaphone. “ _Stand down, soldier! You are out of your head_!”

 

“No, General!” the one called Blonsky shouted, smacking one of the choppers out of the sky. “I finally understand! This is how it’s meant to be! From here, I can rule everything! I am a god amongst men, the true pinnacle of everything a – “

 

_Thwip!_

_Thawp!_

_Thwip!_

 

“ _For the rebellion_!” a modulated voice yelled, and suddenly, there were three normal-sized figures circling the giant person, attached by some kind of string that spun circles around his legs.

 

“What are you – “

 

“ _For real, if you were any kind of Star Wars fan, you’d understand why this stupid plan of yours was doomed to fail_ ,” that same modulated voice said, growing louder and fainter as the source spun in wide arcs around the giant man’s legs. “ _Like…I’m feeling a bit of secondhand embarrassment for you right now. You’re having your idiotic godlike moment here, and I respect that. A taste of any kind of power is enough to send someone off the deep end, but for real. You’re just…big. Yeah, okay, you’re stronger and just generally wielding a bit more mass, but after that, what? You’re slow_.”

 

“ _And huge_ ,” another of them said, and Frank knew a female voice when he heard one, even through layers of modulation. “ _So much for keeping your balance. I mean, if you had any kind of appreciation for physics, you’d understand that that this whole thing was kind of a dumb idea_.”

 

“ _Seriously,_ ” the first voice said, “ _your strategy is just ‘be bigger than the other guy’, and there are just like a thousand holes in that plan_.”

 

“ _What do we do with him, Spidey_?” the third one piped in, and Frank saw a third decidedly female figure swing around toward him before zipping away in an arc. “ _Wrap him up and move on_?”

 

Frank could only watch as the web assault overpowered the large man, his arms wheeling comically as he laboriously tried to maintain his balance, but soon, he toppled, seeming to fall in slow motion for a few long seconds before the ground rumbled beneath Frank’s feet with his impact.

 

“ _Hoth is saved_!” Spider-Man shouted, landing on a wall above and behind Frank. “ _That was awesome_!”

 

“ _Spider-Man_!” the same voice shouted from the remaining helicopter. “ _Your help is appreciated, but as a civilian, you are required to proceed to the nearest evacuation point for extraction and_ – “

 

“ _Just gonna stop you right there_ ,” Spider-Man said, his voice amplifying through his modulator. “ _Who just put down the giant fella while you buzzed around in your little whirligig? Jackpot, help me out here_?”

 

“ _That was definitely you, Spidey_ ,” the one called Jackpot said from her perch atop a nearby light post. So, Jackpot was the one in the black and gold suit with triple-sevens on the front. Closer inspection told Frank that the middle seven was a stylized scorpion. Someone couldn’t seem to pick a theme.

 

“ _So, you want me and my pals here to come with you and leave the city, when we’re the ones that seem pretty good at saving it_?” Spider-Man asked, and Frank had to begrudge the kid a bit of respect.

 

He sure didn’t seem to be the type to bow to authority.

 

“ _You are interfering with the United States military_!” the General shouted back, and Spider-Man shook his head.

 

“ _Alright, why don’t we just wake up the big guy so you can continue getting your asses handed to you_!?” he shouted, his voice almost overpowering his modulator. “ _Forgive me getting in the way of your very important loss_!”

 

“ _Spidey, let’s just go_ ,” Black Widow (Frank recognized her from the news) said, swinging over to land next to Spider-Man. Despite her name, her costume was equal parts black and white, with a red spider insignia on the chest. Well, the name fit the whole bug theme, at least. “ _He’s not worth the trouble_.”

 

Before the General could splutter anything else into his megaphone, the trio was gone over the rooftops, and Frank quickly made his exit, too. Technically speaking, he was an escaped convict, thanks to Spider-Man’s pals Iceman, Electro, and Dusk.

 

That score would get settled in due time. Frank couldn’t fault their efforts at cleaning up the streets, even if their methods were a bit soft.

 

In the meantime, the city was dirtier than ever; it was time to clean.

 

……

 

George could remember a time when he hadn’t even been able to get Gwen to clean up her room; now, she was out there trying to keep New York from falling apart around its citizens’ ears.

 

Strange, how life turned out.

 

“You got a great daughter, George,” Wade said, settling back in next to him and handing him his phone. “She obviously cares for you a lot.”

 

“Yeah, she always tells me we spend enough time worrying about each other, we break even,” George said with a chuckle, glancing at his phone. “Did you add me as a Facebook friend?”

 

“Yeah, I love this social networking thing,” Wade admitted. “Old war buddies are just a little word-box away, and if friends move away, graduate, whatever, they can still keep in touch. Miracles of technology.”

 

“Until Henry from the wrestling team who used to shove me into lockers tries to add me as a friend and act all buddy-buddy,” George said, and Wade chuckled, clapping him on the back.

 

“Well, maybe we need some cruddy experiences in the past to keep us rooted in the present,” Wade said. “Besides…bullies will always be bullies. That’s what we’re here for. We need to show them that even if the little guy can’t stand up for himself, there’s always someone to count on. It could be Henry from the wrestling team, some asshole at boot camp, or – “

 

“Wait,” George said as a sound met his ears. It sounded…strangely familiar but very incongruous to the situation. He stood, and Wade climbed to his feet behind him, remaining quiet while George homed in on the sound. “Is that…Mötley Crüe?”

 

The music was suddenly much louder, accompanied by a revving engine sound, and George shouted over the gymnasium.

 

“Everyone away from the wall!”

 

_Crack-WHOOM!_

 

George saw a chunk of masonry flying directly at him before a blue-clad arm held a shield in front of his face, and a resounding _clung_ told George that he would probably not have lived through the impact. Standing, he peered out from around Wade to see that a large military vehicle of some kind had flown through the gymnasium wall and skidded to a halt in the middle of the floor, still blasting Kickstart My Heart by Mötley Crüe. A large, pale-yellow monster of some kind was clinging to the back, while a smaller green creature straight out of those Lord of the Rings movies from back when Gwenny was a little girl climbed from a hatch on the roof.

 

“Good day, ladies! Gentlemen! Boys and…girls of all ages!” he shouted with a manic grin. “I am pleased to announce that the, uh pyrotechnics show will begin in mere moments! It is also my…pleasure to inform you that I cannot guarantee the safety of anyone within a ten-yard radius of the Doof Wagon, so if you’ll all please clear the blast zone! Or…or don’t; I’m not terribly picky. Hobgoblin!?”

 

“Get the refugees out of here,” Wade said, and George didn’t hesitate to obey, hurrying toward the crowd and gesturing toward the southern wall of the gym.

 

“Everyone toward the south exit!” he shouted. “South exit, double-time! Don’t worry about grabbing anything, we gotta get out of here!”

 

To their credit, the people of New York seemed to take this new development in stride, clambering to their feet and rushing for the exit. A scrum developed, but a few police officers quickly began directing people through the doors. George lingered nearby, glancing back to see Wade, Sharon, and Becky facing off with the two goblin fellows.

 

“Captain America!” the Green Goblin said with obvious relish. “Oh, this is…this is an honor, you know? The Beast of America, here to snuff out the first signs of true freedom!”

 

“Not freedom if you’re stealing someone else’s to do your thing,” Wade said, gripping his shield.

 

“So you’d hold me back from being as free as I can so someone else can reap the same rewards with half the work?” the Goblin said with a sneer. “You let the lazy moochers vote, they vote the ones into office that’ll keep letting them be…lazy and keep mooching. Meanwhile, old Jeffery King works his ass off every day and gives half his paycheck to your good old Uncle Sam, comes home, and takes out his aggression, his…dissatisfaction with how much life _sucks_ on his son!”

 

“Sounds like you’re letting emotions cloud your judgment,” Wade said calmly. “Maybe you’d like to talk about what’s got you so worked up?”

 

“Oh, no, I’d much rather burn this place to ground and just…fuck the city up the nose, fast and dirty,” the Goblin cackled, glancing to his companion, who raised two fists aglow with flaming globs of what looked to George like lava. “Hobgoblin, if you please?”

 

Without another word, the Hobgoblin held his hands out, and twin streams of white-hot liquid surged forth, seething the air around them. Whatever the viscous fluid touched burst into flame, the areas immediately splashed seeming to melt away as though the goop were acidic.

 

George doubted it would be pleasant to be hit by that stuff.

 

“Becky, help Captain Stacy with evacuation!” Wade shouted, and Becky Barnes tore away from the group toward George. The girl was scarcely older than Gwen, probably in her early twenties, but she followed orders with military precision, skidding to a halt next to George and ushering the last of the evacuees from the gymnasium as it burned around them.

 

“We have to get out!” she said urgently to George, who glanced back toward the truck to see it rumbling to life, tires squealing against the hardwood floor of the gym as it peeled out and spun to zoom back toward the hole it had left in the wall, Wade and Sharon in hot pursuit.

 

“Alright,” he said. “Let’s get – “

 

“Isaac!” a voice shouted, and George and Becky rounded to see a woman in her thirties coughing as she made her way back through the smoke. Her eyes landed on George, wide and pleading. “My son! He wasn’t with the group! He was in the boys’ locker room with his friend!”

 

“Get her!” George said, already pushing Becky toward the woman before turning and hurrying back across the gym. The flames were spreading quickly, smoke filling the room, and George was only lucky that the ceiling was so high, leaving plenty of room for the gas to billow up and collect before it descended upon him. It was hot, uncomfortably so, and George snorted to himself as remembered his early days as a volunteer fireman.

 

If only the guys could see old “Quick Change” now.

 

Stumbling into the locker room, which was also quickly accumulating a haze of smoke, George called out.

 

“Isaac!” he shouted. “Isaac, if you can hear me, I need you to come to my voice!”

 

“Help!” a thin voice came from further in the locker room. “She’s stuck!”

 

George hurried further into the smoke, coughing and covering his mouth and nose with his sleeve. Through the foggy billowing clouds, he could see a boy of about ten with a girl about the same age. The girl’s leg was pinned under a fallen locker, probably shaken loose in the impact of the goblins’ vehicle or the booming explosions left by their strange plasma-lava. She was sobbing and gripping to Isaac, begging him not to leave her, and Isaac was gripping just as tightly back. George was uncomfortably reminded of how close Gwen and Peter had seemed when they first met. Just as unwilling to part, even for the end of the world.

 

“Help her!” Isaac insisted, and George dropped to his knees, gripping the lockers and lifting with all his might. They were heavy, though, and he wasn’t like Gwen or Wade. He was just a man, and he was already feeling the effects of smoke inhalation. Gasping for breath, he heaved again, but the lockers didn’t budge. He could have all the good intentions in the world, join New York’s Finest and take to the streets, but when things got this level of disastrous, he just couldn’t save the city on his own. Grunting and straining his aching muscles as he attempted to lift the locker, he hated to admit it, but he just couldn’t do this alone. Gwen might have been powerful enough to toss them away with little to no effort, but he was…not enough.

 

“Don’t give up, Captain,” a familiar voice said, and suddenly, Wade was next to him. The lockers were lighter in his hands, and he felt them shift, the metal groaning as they lifted from the girl’s trapped leg. On his other side, Sharon skidded to her knees, taking the girl’s hand and sliding her from under the lockers before lifting her into her arms.

 

“Captain America,” George said, coughing, and Wade dragged him to his feet.

 

“Captain Stacy,” he said with a smirk, leading him toward the exit. “We might have to get you a shield, too. You’re stealing my thunder.”

 

“I couldn’t lift it,” George admitted as Wade led him into the gym and toward the exit.

 

“But you were willing to try,” Wade said. “Sometimes, that’s all that matters. But your daughter would be pretty upset with me if I ditched you, so let’s get you to safety.”

 

Gwen. That was right. Maybe George wasn’t the superhero he’d dreamt he could be, but if he could be the type to inspire heroics in the likes of his daughter, an up-and-coming superhero in her own right, maybe that was enough. But to continue to inspire her in the right way (and not in the vengeful way that Parker was lapsing towards), he needed to be alive, to guide her and, by extension, her friends.

 

If George Stacy could help the Neighborhood Watch in any capacity, it would not be posthumously.

 

He had a city to save.

 

……

 

“They’re resisting, Brother,” Oliver said, shaking his head. “Why do they fight it? Why do they want to instill their trappings, their control?”

 

Kaine sighed, folding one set of arms while the other came up to cup his chin curiously. He and his newly rescued brother had retreated to Kaine’s more permanent headquarters to observe the fallout of the Terrigen bomb. For the most part, things were going according to plan; the citizens were embracing their new powers, taking to the streets and generally enjoying the newfound freedom their abilities afforded.

 

Unfortunately, many of them saw this freedom as an opportunity to become the worst sorts of criminals. Kaine had been hoping that these powers, these…great powers would instill a sense of equally great responsibility. He’d never met Uncle Ben, but memories drifting along the Great Web, snatches of his wisdom…those were what motivated him, more than anything.

 

Uncle Ben, the sage, the wise one. His words guided Peter Parker, taught him that power begat responsibility, that to truly be free, mankind needed only a push. Peter and his friends had been given the spider bite, and they’d taken spiritedly to the concept of having superpowers, swinging along the streets of New York and being the sorts of heroes the city deserved. His friends, his comrades in the Avengers, even his associates like the X-Men, all of them had shown that in the right hands, power could balance the world on its own. Humanity didn’t need notions of imagined authority, of police officers or politicians who were no more or less human than the citizens they pretended to control. The world was ready for the next step, for going about life as they saw fit and trusting the truly powerful to embrace responsibility and oversee them.

 

It seemed, however, that not everyone was as willing to embrace responsibility as the Neighborhood Watch.

 

“I may have miscalculated,” Kaine admitted in a grumble. “We’ve powered them up. We’ve herded them together. But it seems, before any progress can be made, we must…cull them.”

 

“Hm, of course,” Oliver said with a nod. “The average human only looks out for himself, and even then, they only behave because of the threat of reprisal. Take away the treat….”

 

“How could I have been so foolish?” Kaine chided himself.

 

“Hopeful,” Oliver corrected him bracingly.

 

“What’s the difference?” Kaine shot back, making for the console. “I never once stopped to consider that Parker might be a special case. I naively hoped that others would follow in his example, rise above such base instincts to help their fellow man.”

 

“The ones that would do such a thing are bogged down fighting off the ones that would misuse their gifts,” Oliver concluded, and Kaine snarled. “Are we to teach them the error of their ways?”

 

“Well, you still have a great many of your delightful little metal pets,” Kaine said, tapping at a few keys on his control console. “With them, and some slight modifications to my raptors’ commands, I believe we should be able to weed out those undeserving of their gifts.”

 

“Of course,” Oliver said with a cackle. “You’ve sown the seeds, you’ve let them grow. I believe it’s time to prune the weeds.”

 

“We’ll show them the true meaning of great power,” Kaine said in a low voice. “The burden of great responsibility.”


	19. Chapter 19

Carlie Cooper didn’t want to die.

 

But more and more, that was seeming like a very real possibility. New York was tearing itself apart around her, and she had no one. Dad was…gone, dead long ago in some drug bust gone wrong, and Mom hadn’t been in the apartment when the bombs had gone off, off with one of her druggie boyfriends. Carlie had hunkered down as long as possible, but when some giant…man had ripped her apartment building apart, she’d been forced to flee.

 

Now, she was stumbling through the streets of the city, wincing at even the slightest of sounds. Off in the distance, the echoes of New York descending into chaos bounced along the streets, ending in a constant rushing wail that seemed to fill her ears. She yearned to just hide somewhere, ride this all out. That was what she did when things got scary. She hid away until the scariness was gone. When she’d been young, Dad had always found her cowering in her closet, wrapped in blankets and hiding away from the thunder of lightning of the occasional storm that had swept through the city.

 

“It’s just noises, Carlie,” he’d told her. “Just a bunch of noise. Sometimes the sky has to remind us that it’s still there, you know? So it makes a racket, and you see it up there, right? Lightning, thunder, and it’s all there, and it’s actually kinda pretty, isn’t it?”

 

Dad was always about that, about taking the most terrifying things and humanizing them, making Carlie see the little bits of humanity. If you humanized something even a little, it helped you empathize with it. That could be good, of course, but it could also be bad.

 

Like right now, as she watched her beloved city being ripped apart by those that had once called themselves her citizens, she could only muse that these people had once been normal New Yorkers. People as normal as her, gifted powers by the strange blue mist, were now turning on the place they’d once called home and looting, rioting, just generally causing mayhem.

 

Was this what happened when a person was given a taste of power? Carlie liked to imagine that she would use said powers for good, don a costume and save the people of New York like Spider-Man or the other members of the Neighborhood Watch.

 

What she wouldn’t give for one of them to be watching her back right now.

 

Hunched in upon herself, Carlie made her way along the sidewalk with hurried footsteps. The less time she spent out in the open like this, the less likely she was to run into –

 

“Hey, looka what we got here, fellas,” an oily voice said. “Another poor little sweetie with no place to go.”

 

Well, exactly this sort.

 

“Look at her, all scared and alone,” another gruffer voice added with a chuckle as Carlie grumbled and slowed to a halt, a feeling of dread welling up as she glanced around and saw no less than five rather large men surrounding her. “You come with us, babygirl. We’ll keep you safe and sound.”

 

What was this an eighties movie of some sort? Was she about to be rescued by –

 

“ _Gentlemen, this is entirely too chauvinistic for me to let continue_ ,” a modulated voice said, and a girl Carlie recognized as the Scarlet Spider swooped into view, feet out straight toward what had to be the lead goon, since he was just the biggest one. Despite his size, the Scarlet Spider easily kicked him away, transferring her momentum to him and landing spryly in front of Carlie. Her outfit was (unsurprisingly) mostly red, with a large black spider logo that took up most of the torso and wrapped around her back and down her arms. A thick brown ponytail sprung out of the back of the mask, swishing a bit as the girl turned glowing pink eyes on her.

 

“ _You okay_?” the Scarlet Spider asked her with evident concern. “ _Did they get their hands on you? Because I’ll give them a few good smacks if they did_.”

 

“No, no,” Carlie said with a smile as relief flooded through her. “I mean, they didn’t, but you can smack them anyway. I won’t tell.”

 

A breathy laugh made its way through the modulator in the girl’s mask, and she turned to face the group of thugs now retreating when they realized that there was an honest-to-God superhero facing them down. Scarlet Spider held her hand out, pointing down the street and looking back toward Carlie.

 

“ _Head that way, meet up with Spider-Girl, and she’ll help you to an airbus that’s evacuating civilians_ ,” she said. “ _I’m gonna kick some ass_.”

 

One of the braver thugs held his hands out, wincing as his nails grew out into long, boney claws.

 

“You can try, girl, but we’re not your usual pushovers,” he growled. Behind him, two more held their arms out. A burly black-haired man sprouted twin pairs of claws from his wrists, and the third grew a series of boney spikes out of his arms.

 

“Um…are you gonna be okay?” Carlie asked, and the Scarlet Spider just snorted.

 

“ _I can handle this,_ ” she said. “ _Get moving_.”

 

Carlie backed a few steps away and took off down the street.

 

“Hey, where you going – ah!” One of the thugs started to say something, but there was a flurry of movement behind her, and out of the corner of her eye, she saw him collide with a lamppost, denting it and causing it to fall into the street.

 

“ _This way_!” another modulated voice called from ahead of Carlie. She saw Spider-Girl outside of a mostly-intact Mexican deli, gesturing her inside. “ _C’mon, there’s an evac point down the alley out back_.”

 

“What about Scarlet Spider?” Carlie asked, allowing the hero to usher her into the building.

 

“ _She’ll have help_ ,” Spider-Girl said.

 

……

 

Riley wondered how many of these weirdos had needed psychological help before the Terrigen bomb and were just acting out on freak impulses now that they had the powers to back them up.

 

“Get back here, you bitch!”

 

“ _Really_?” Riley asked, ducking under a lunge and zipping back as the guy with the studded arms swung wildly at her. Dodging their laborious efforts with ease, she waiting for an opening and stepped into the Fingernails’s reach, socking him solidly in the chest to send him flying backward. “ _Really, you’re just gonna go with bitch? A female superhero is kicking your ass, and you just go with the generic ‘I hate women’ response. Do you know how many times I’ve been called a bitch since I was born? More than I’m happy with_!”

 

Wrist Guy took a lunging swipe at her, and she ducked easily under it. These guys were enhanced and required a bit more effort than a common thug, but Peter Parker (and by extension, Riley Benson) was a superhuman that could give Captain America a pretty solid beatdown, so this fight was a bit one-sided. Riley curled her fingers in on her palm and quickly pressed her hand against Wrist Guy’s side.

 

_Zzzt-SHAFF!_

 

“Gah, fuck!” Wrist Guy shouted, seizing and stumbling, managing to stay on his feet but stumbling enough for Riley to hop up and kick him solidly in the back, slamming him into the ground. She landed, and spider sense warned her about an incoming punch from Arms. Turning, she snagged his wrist, yanking him over her shoulder and flexing her back to slam him into the ground. Hard. In the distance, Nails was climbing to his feet, and the look in his eyes was wild. He didn’t care about the odds anymore; he just wanted to hurt Riley, if only for the sake of his wounded pride.

 

Riley was pretty used to that look.

 

“I’m gonna fucking kill y – “

 

He didn’t even get to finish threat, as Cindy swung in, her new suit looking good as she kicked Nails solidly in the side, webbing him up while he was airborne and stringing him up from a light post. Cindy, or Silk, had opted for a mostly white number with black on the arms and a red web pattern along the chest. Her mask only covered her face, leaving her dark black locks to fly around similar to Riley’s. It was just so much easier than cramming all of that hair into a mask, and no way were either of them going to chop off their beloved locks.

 

“ _Figured you had it, but I wanted to help_ ,” Cindy said with a little shrug as she made her way over, sighing. “ _I thought it would be a fifty-fifty shot on good or bad, but it seems like everyone that gets any kinda power is just going bad_.”

 

“ _Well, New York wasn’t exactly the most stable place to begin with_ ,” Riley said, sighing as she looked around for Arms and Wrists, but she found only Arms, slumped where she had slammed him into the ground. “ _Where’s the other –_ “

 

Spider sense! Riley ducked away from a lunge, Cindy leaping back as Wrists charged into their midst. Riley was just about to web him up when an inhuman shriek sounded, and all three of them turned to see a…robot creature bounding toward them.

 

“What the fuck…?” Wrists grumbled.

 

It looked like…well, like the Manhattan Mangle with an upgrade. Whoever had made it had apparently been going for a more realistic look this time around, as the ragged, tattered fur was gone. In fact, it had no fur at all, looking like an anatomically-correct bear skeleton, but made of metal. Inside, wires and cables formed some metal facsimile of guts.

 

“ _Aaaaah_!” it screamed out, and frankly, Riley had to agree.

 

The metal beast tore toward the trio, and Riley and Cindy leapt away, Wrists standing his ground.

 

“ _Get out of the way_!” Riley shouted down at him, and Wrists shook his head.

 

“I’m not afraid of so – ugh! ACK!”

 

“ _Oh…oh, ew_ ,” Cindy said, looking away from the grisly sight. Faster than Wrists could even move, he had been…well, the bear bot still had claws that were now dripping red as it turned its gaze up to them. It shuddered, letting another synthesized roar before turning and starting to lope away.

 

“ _No you don’t_ ,” Riley said, already holding out her hand to web onto the opposite building and swing toward the bear, but before she could even squeeze her web shooter, something zipped by, colliding with the bear and sending a shower of sparks spurting from its skull. As Riley and Cindy watched, the bear staggered and collapsed to the ground, an arrow sticking out of its neck.

 

“ _Legolas_?” Cindy asked, looking in the direction the arrow had come from. Riley followed her gaze to see a man standing on the rooftop above her. She crawled up, Cindy right behind her, and they both perched on the edge of the roof. Upon closer inspection, the man was wearing a purple and black uniform emblazoned with the SHIELD logo. He was probably in his very early thirties, maybe even late twenties, with short blond hair and sea-blue eyes that he turned on Riley.

 

“Scarlet Spider, right?” he asked, glancing to Cindy. “And you’re…Silk.”

 

“ _Who are_ you _, then_?” Silk asked, and the guy slung his bow over his shoulder. He had a quiver full of arrows, but it was some kind of hi-tech setup, likely packed with arrowheads with all sorts of different purposes, like the stun arrow he’d used on the bear.

 

“I’m Agent Clint Barton,” he said. “With SHIELD. You want a codename, you can call me Hawkeye, but my identity’s not exactly a secret. I’m with the evac team, saw you might need some help.”

 

“ _Scarlet_!” Julie’s voice called, and she crawled over the opposite edge of the rooftop, hurrying over and pulling Riley to her feet and into a hug. “ _What happened_?”

 

“ _Some…robot bear skeleton thing showed up and…eugh_ ,” Cindy said, shaking her head. “ _I’m gonna have nightmares about that_.”

 

“They’re the Gamma Series,” Clint said. “Your pal Osnick’s been building a robot army or something. He turned ‘em loose on New York, and now they’re going after anyone committing a crime, looking for blood.”

 

“ _Oliver Osnick_?” Riley asked, and Clint nodded.

 

“We had our science guys try to break into their programming, but the only thing we know is that he’s up to Delta Series, and they’re supposed to be some kinda peacekeepers,” he went on. “Whatever operating system he came up with for these guys, it’s one of the most complicated we’ve ever seen. But we’ll crack ‘em open. Anyway, do you kids want a ride out? We’ve got a refuge set up in Jersey.”

 

“ _We’re gonna stay_ ,” Riley said with a shake of her head. “ _There’s still people out there that need help_.”

 

Clint nodded at that, smiling at her. “Well, SHIELD will be keeping an eye on you, at least,” he said. “You’re not alone out there.”

 

He made his way toward the roof-access point and stepped inside, the door closing behind him. Once he was out of sight, Riley turned and wrapped Julie in her arms, squeezing her.

 

“ _Hugs_.”

 

Julie enthusiastically squeezed her back, nuzzling up into her neck and humming happily. “ _You okay_?” she asked softly. “ _You’re doubling up on hug breaks, not that I’m complaining_.”

 

“ _I’m just…ready for a nap after all this_ ,” Riley said, and Julie nodded.

 

“ _Two-day siesta_ ,” she said. “ _We’ll make Harry serve omelets in bed every two hours. He’d be down for that_.”

 

“ _He actually would_ ,” Riley admitted, and Julie giggled through her modulator, pressing her nose against Riley’s.

 

“ _Love you_ ,” she whispered, and Riley smiled behind her mask.

 

“ _Love you too_ ,” she said right back, and Julie took her hand, leading her toward the small base of operations they’d set up in an abandoned apartment.

 

She seriously needed a nap.

 

……

 

“ _Seriously, I’m talking just an entire room, nothing but mattresses, blankets, pillows_ – “

 

“ _And a fan_ ,” MJ said, interrupting Lana, who just nodded.

 

“ _Background noise_ ,” she said. “ _And like…those thick-ass curtains that block sunlight, but we also have a nightlight for atmospheric mood-lighting, you know_?”  


“Stop, you’re making me tired just talking like that,” Kitty said on a yawn. “When this is all over, I just wanna sleep for like three days.”

 

“Pretty sure the whole Neighborhood Watch is feeling that,” Jess said, glancing toward the edge of the building. “Especially our man.”

 

“ _He just looks so tired lately_ ,” MJ agreed, shaking her head as she too gazed over to Pete, who was surveying the city with Gwen at his side. “ _Him_ and _Riley_.”

 

“Show of hands, who knew about the clone thing?” Jess said, and MJ and Lana held their hands up, Lana shrugging at the look Jess gave her.

 

“ _I mean, I kinda found out by accident_ ,” she said. “ _I overheard a few things here and there, and they just told me to keep me from wondering what the hell was going on_.”

 

“ _I was there when Riley showed up, so…I mean, I found out just because_ ,” MJ said. “ _I guess…I never really thought about the fact that it was Pete’s brain in a girl body. I mean…I_ knew _it, but…._ ”

 

“We definitely owe Riley a pretty intense cuddle session,” Kitty said with a firm nod. “But after this is over. Right now, we’re saving New York.”

 

“Ladies, form up,” Pete said, pulling his mask over his face. “ _We’ve got a commotion_.”

 

“Would you call it a ruckus?” Jess asked, flames appearing around her feet as she lifted off and floated over to land next to Pete.

 

“ _I think it could be called a ruckus_ ,” Pete said with a chuckle.

 

“ _Could you describe the ruckus_?” MJ asked, and Pete snickered.

 

“ _Some kinda megazord robot thing_ ,” he said. “ _Looks like the Ringer, Boomerang, and the Kangaroo_.”

 

“ _Ugh, I hate the Kangaroo_ ,” MJ said. “ _He totally ruined the concept of a sexy Australian accent for me_.”

 

“What about a sexy nerd with spider-powers?” Kitty asked, and MJ smirked at that.

 

“ _That one’s still going strong_ ,” she said, hopping up to crouch next to Pete. It was still strange for Kitty to see her in such a pose. She remembered when MJ hadn’t had powers at all and had just been a girl crawling around on robotic spider-legs. Now, she had powers similar to Pete’s with a dose of scorpion toughness, and they suspected she might have some kind of venom that they had yet to explore.

 

There was a lot of research to be done when this was over.

 

For now, they had to deal with a criminal trio piloting some serious military hardware they had no business messing around with. Down below, a boxy robot with two thick, rectangular legs was stomping down an abandoned side street, occasionally firing boomerang-shaped projectiles at storefronts. Once it blew one open, a figure would emerge from a hatch between the legs, dash over to the store and return with some loot, climbing back up inside to move on and repeat.

 

“ _Shadow, hop on_ ,” Pete said, kneeling, and Kitty happily hopped up and climbed onto his back. “ _We’re gonna drop in, Shadowcat’s gonna phase through that thing and brick it. Widow, you and Jackpot wanna open it up and get those guys out of there? Firestar, run interference, make sure they don’t bolt, and Bombshell, blow that tank to pieces_.”

 

“ _I love it when you say things like that_ ,” Lana said with a happy little hop.

 

“ _We all good_?” Pete asked, and Kitty squeezed him extra tight, nuzzling into his neck as the others all chorused an affirmative. “ _Alright, Shadowcat and I will lead, you guys stay on us_.”

 

He leapt, and Kitty squeezed onto him as he descended, webbing onto the robot thing and yanking himself toward it. Kitty let herself float free of him so as not to disrupt his technology as she phased through the robot. She was treated to the strange blackness of phasing straight through a material, a second-long flash of three bemused faces sitting in the cabin, and then she was falling to the ground, landing lightly and peering up as the tank sparked and shuddered to a halt. Suddenly, Pete was there, whisking her off her feet and making her heart flutter a bit as he carried her away from the collapsing tank, which shook the ground with its impact.

 

“I could have phased through it,” Kitty said as Pete set her down, and he scoffed through his mask. Kitty could perfectly picture his exasperated smile, the little roll of his eyes he always got when he was called out for his adorable little acts of chivalry in protecting any of them.

 

“ _Sue me, I didn’t wanna watch a robot fall onto you_ ,” he said with a shrug, and Kitty giggled a bit, leaning forward to pull his mask up, tugging her own out of the way to plant a tiny kiss on his lips.

 

“Love you,” she whispered.

 

“Love you,” he said back, pulling his mask back into place. “ _Now, I think we should be expecting_ – “

 

_Whump-BOOOOM!_

 

“Bombshell to take full advantage of explosion privileges?” Kitty finished for him, and Pete snickered, watching as twisted metal rained down on the street nearby, a plume of smoke rising into the air. Nearby, Gwen squeaked and dodged a chunk of metal falling right onto her.

 

“ _She doesn’t get to cut loose that often_ ,” he told her. “ _I’m happy for her_.”

 

“You’re so cute when you’re being a good boyfriend,” Kitty said, taking his hand and tugging him toward the commotion nearby. Gwen was swiftly dealing with the Boomerang, dodging his projectiles with ease and webbing him up, socking him in the chest and sending him flying long enough to web him up to a light pole. Nearby, MJ was swiftly ducking away from the Ringer’s rings, snagging them right out of the air and tossing them back at him. A few collided with him, staggering him to the point that MJ could duck in and trip him up with a swift kick to the ankles, webbing him to the ground.

 

The Kangaroo was being less cooperative.

 

“You fecking brats!” he shouted, climbing over the wreckage of the robot and throwing a huge, twisted piece of metal toward Peter, who leapt away and watched it sail away down the street. The Kangaroo had gotten a few upgrades since they last ran into him. Instead of an animatronic suit, it looked more like he’d had his legs replaced with cybernetic kangaroo legs, complete with a tail for balance, and his upper body was absolutely ripped with muscle, his arms as thick as a tree trunk. To top it off, two floppy kangaroo ears sprouted from the sides of his head, flitting toward sounds in a way that lead Kitty to think they too were cybernetic.

 

“ _Cybernetic legs_ ,” Pete said with a significant glance at Kitty, who gasped.

 

“Throw me,” she said as Kangaroo charged at them, and Lana moved to intercept, veering him off course with a bunch of small explosions that he dodged away from.

 

“Get out of it, you fecking bitch!” Kangaroo said, veering off course as Peter tried to take aim with his projectile Kitty. He ran at Lana, his tail curling and smacking her into the air.

 

“ _No!_ ” Peter shouted, and Kitty was settled to the ground as he webbed to a wall and yanked himself into the air, flying to intercept Lana as she dropped. He gripped her tightly, and the rest of the girls converged on the pair as Peter cradled Lana in her arms.

 

“ _Lana_?” he asked softly. “ _Talk to me, Lana_.”

 

“ _I’m good_ ,” Lana breathed through her mask, squirming in Pete’s arms. “ _I’m alright, just…ow, stings a little_.”

 

“Aw, did I hurt the poor little cunt?” Kangaroo called, and Peter tensed next to Kitty, gently easing Lana into Jess’s arms as he stood. Before they could stop him, Pete was leaping away.

 

“ _Pe—Spidey_!” Jess shouted as Peter sailed into the air, webbing onto a stoplight and looping around it to gain some momentum before he sailed at the Kangroo. He landed on the cyborg, gripping him tightly.

 

“Ow, what the fuck are – “

 

_Zztt-SHAFF!_

 

“Gah, you son of a – “

 

_Thwip-thwip!_

 

Pete webbed onto the Kangaroo’s neck, landing and gripping the pavement as he yanked him downward, bending the cyborg backward until Pete could grip his shoulders, lifting him and leaping to slam him into the pavement. He struck then, crawling across the Kangaroo to grip his cybernetic tail and rip it away, tossing it aside. Next was one of the cyborg’s legs, Kangaroo cussing and kicking as Peter simply yanked the limb away.

 

“Let me alone, you crazy – “

 

“ _Shut the fuck up_!” Peter shouted. “ _You think you get to just do what you’ve been doing without someone else doing the same to you? Not so fun when you’re the one being beaten and attacked, no way to defend yourself is it. …IS IT_!?”

 

“You’re mad, you crazy – “

 

“ _IS IT!?_ ” Pete shouted, and Kitty glanced over to Gwen, who nodded and leapt into the midst of the fight. Pete was just yanking the Kangaroo up by the scruff of his neck with one hand, his other rearing back and curling into a fist when Gwen gripped it by the wrist. Pete twitched and glanced back, slumping when he saw her.

 

“ _Spidey_ ,” Gwen said in a soft voice. “ _That’s enough, okay_?”

 

Kitty watched as Pete’s grip slowly slackened, the Kangaroo falling to the ground and attempting to scrabble away, but with only one leg left, he didn’t get far before MJ swooped in and webbed him up. Gwen was oblivious to all of this, her attention focused fully on their boyfriend. Her arms slid up around Pete’s shoulders as the other girls gathered around him. Pete was breathing heavily, but he seemed to be calming. His voice was a bit husky, though, as he spoke through his modulator.

 

“ _Sorry_ ,” he said. “ _Got a little…carried away_.”

 

“ _Hey, deep breaths_ ,” Lana said, and Gwen stepped away to pull Lana into her spot, pushing her into Pete’s arms. “ _I’m okay. See_?”

 

Pete let a deep sigh, slumping and dropping his head onto Lana’s shoulder. Lana reached up and wrapped her arms around him, cooing softly into his ear and rubbing at his back.

 

“ _Hey, hey, it’s alright_ ,” she said. “ _I’m okay. I’m safe_.”

 

“ _I’m a mess_ ,” Pete said with a sheepish laugh, and Lana shook her head.

 

“ _You’re_ our _mess_ ,” she whispered, hugging him tightly. “ _C’mon, let’s go take a little break, hm_?”

 

“There’s a furniture store a block back,” Jess said, gesturing over her shoulder with her thumb. “We could go take five. Or fifteen.”

 

“ _Oh! I’ll raid that supermarket we passed, grab some snacks_ ,” Gwen said with a little bounce.

 

“I’ll help,” Kitty said, rolling her eyes. “Between you, Jackpot, and Spidey, you’ll annihilate about sixty pounds of food.”

 

“ _Gotta load up on starches, natural webbing_ ,” Gwen said with a wiggle of her fingers.

 

“ _What did I do to deserve you guys_?” Pete asked as Lana tugged him away.

 

“You were a fucking dork,” Jess said with a snicker, floating along. “C’mon, let us help you for once.”

 

……

 

“I need some serious psychological help right now,” Ganke said.

 

“For once, I agree with you,” Miles retorted.

 

“Dude, Peter Parker is fucking adorable!” Ganke shouted.

 

“Not gonna agree on that,” Miles said, prompting a giggle from Kamala, who sat on Miles’s other side on the edge of the rooftop, passing the two cups of coffee as she sipped at her own. “Ganke’s having an existential crisis.”

 

“We have Peter Parker, who I admire in a huge way, with all of that super awesome nerdy big brother vibe he puts off,” Ganke said, “and we put that brain in a smoking hot girl body. How am I supposed to deal with this!?”

 

“You just…deal,” Miles said. “I mean, yeah, it’s a bit weird, but it’s gotta suck for Riley. Imagine waking up one day and being a girl.”

 

“Actually, I don’t think Ganke would have a problem with that,” Kamala said with a playful little smile.

 

“Not even kinda,” Ganke said. “Yeah, there’s the whole ‘My life isn’t mine anymore’ thing, but c’mon, you’re a hot chick.”

 

“I’m glad to see you’ve got your priorities all sorted out,” Miles said, and Ganke gave a solemn nod before tensing.

 

“Masks,” he said, and Miles and Kamala immediately reached for their masks as he did the same. Kamala (or Elastigirl, as they had finally settled on) had only her domino mask, but she had fashioned together a fairly nice costume out of an old suit belonging to Sue Storm (making it perfect for stretching as she did) and a scarf that seemed to defy gravity, staying wrapped around her even while clinging to Miles as they swung around.

 

That was bit distracting. How did Pete deal with it all the time, carting Kitty around?

 

“What’s wrong?” Kamala asked, stepping close to Miles. She tended to gravitate towards him during fights, but Miles had realized after a couple of scuffles with some thugs that she wasn’t looking for protection; she was looking out for him.

 

How progressive.

 

“ _Spider-Sense is going trippy_ ,” Ganke said. “ _Ricochet, aerial recon_?”

 

“ _On it_ ,” Miles said, crouching and leaping with all of his strength. His extra-powerful legs carried him into the air, and he managed a quick look around, spotting the source of Ganke’s spider-sense just as his own began to buzz in his head. The Iron Goblin was lumbering down the street a block over, smashing cars and blowing up buildings. Along for the ride was a small pink figure gliding along on what looked like one of Harry’s hoverboards. Soaring back down to a landing, he hurried across the rooftop to meet Ganke and Kamala.

 

“ _It looks like one of Mr. Osborn’s suits, but it’s blowing a bunch of stuff up_ ,” Miles said. “ _And there’s a girl on a hoverboard with it_.”

 

“Well, Harry did say Oscorp burned down or something,” Kamala pointed out. “I bet they got looted.”

 

“ _That’s not very nice_ ,” Ganke said indignantly. “ _They shouldn’t take what’s not theirs_.”

 

“ _C Team, this is Ricochet_ ,” Miles said into his earwig. “ _We’ve got some kinda stolen Oscorp armor and a pink girl on a glider_.”

 

“ _Sounds like my kinda Saturday_ ,” Bobby said.

 

“ _It’s actually definitely Tuesday_ ,” Flash pointed out. “ _Ricochet, we’re a bit tied up right now. Mayday’s dealing with some evacuees_.”

 

“ _Alright_ ,” Miles sighed. “ _Spidercide_?”

 

“ _I am on my way, friends_!” his voice came over the earpiece, jolting Miles a bit. Well, his commitment to the cause was admirable, at least. Seconds later, Marion Richards was clambering over the side of the building, hurrying toward the trio.

 

“ _What’s up, Spidercide_?” Ganke asked. For whatever reason, he seemed to really click with Peter’s mildly unstable clone, who clicked right back with equal gusto.

 

“ _What is up is the dodgy deeds of these…ne’er-do-wells_!” Marion said as he stalked across the roof, joining the trio and glaring through his mask (Miles couldn’t see his face, but it had to be a glare) down at the duo. “ _How shall we approach this? Phage should likely use his webs on the armor. His webs are strong. Elastigirl can rise to the occasion, embiggen and enlighten, intimidate and frighten yes_?”

 

It was almost disconcerting to think that somewhere in that rambling head of his was Peter’s tactical prowess.

 

“That’s actually a pretty alright plan,” Kamala admitted. “So, Phage and I take the armor, you guys handle the girl?”

 

“ _Sounds good to me_ ,” Miles said, climbing onto the edge of the building, Marion doing the same next to him. “ _We ready_?”

 

“ _Always_ ,” Marion growled.

 

As one, the quartet leapt over the side of the building, Miles aiming for a direct collision with the pink girl on the glider. As he drew closer, he saw that she was actually more of a magenta shade, with onyx-black hair and solid black eyes. A small set of horns protruded from her forehead, and to complete the “sexy devil” look, a long, thin tail curled behind her, complete with a spade at the tip.

 

She looked up as Miles drew closer, her eyes widening in shock before narrowing with determination. Miles saw her shift in an attempt to steer her hoverboard away from him, but he had given his descent a little boost with a kick of his legs, which meant he was really moving. Before she could even scoot a few inches, he was colliding with her.

 

“What—the _fuck_ , you fucking brat!?”

 

“ _Sorry, but I’m a hero and you’re a bad guy…girl…so, like…do the math, right_?” Miles said as he sent her plummeting toward the ground while he webbed off of a lamppost. For good measure, he shot a web at her glider and yanked it toward the ground, where it embedded itself in the asphalt and let a soft whine of motors straining to keep it aloft. The grinding engines rose into a crescendo before sparks flew as they overloaded and gave out.

 

“My glider!” the pink girl shrieked as she landed in a roll and glared up at them. “You asshole!”

 

“ _Sorry for breaking your stolen property_ ,” Miles drawled out, perching on a lamppost and staring down at her. “ _I’m sure it was expensive. For someone else_.”

 

“Right, give me the whole spiel about how I didn’t deserve it because I didn’t make it,” the pink girl said, climbing to her feet with a scoff. “Some privileged rich boy made it in a private lab full of other rich boys, and I don’t deserve it because of that fact alone.”

 

“ _Well…you don’t_ ,” Miles said, shrugging. “ _I mean, look at what you did the moment you got it. Started flying around and blowing things up_.”

 

“That’s just what another privileged white boy would say,” the pink girl said.

 

“ _I’m mixed-race, and neither of them is white_ ,” Miles said. “ _If you’re gonna make this a race thing, try doing something besides being a criminal_.”

 

“I’m only doing the only thing society has left for me to – “

 

“ _Cease your incessant babbling, woman_!” Marion said, swinging in and bodily kicking the pink girl away. She flew into the side of the armored figure, colliding with a solid _clung_ and crumpling to the ground.

 

“ _Lily_!” the suit shouted, turning a large metal faceplate to Miles and straining against Kamala’s arms as they twisted around her and held her in place. “ _You asshole_!”

 

“Focus up, honey,” Kamala said. “You’re stuck.”

 

The suit strained against Ganke’s webbing but couldn’t break through. Two massive arms held themselves aloft at the suit’s sides, and the repulsors in its hands began to glow.

 

_Kreeeeng-KSHOOM!_

 

The webs were singed, some of them wisping away, but most of them held. Changing tactics, the suited figure aimed behind her, at Kamala, and Miles felt a little buzzing in his spider sense.

 

“ _Phage, the hands_!”

 

“ _On it_ ,” Ganke said, zipping forward and jumping.

 

_Thwamp-thwamp!_

 

_Kreeng-WHUMP!_

 

The repulsors fired, but Ganke’s extra-thick webbing blocked the blast, sending a recoil of energy along the suit’s arms that left them smoking a bit.

 

“ _You son of a bitch_!” the armor yelled, shaking out its smoking arms. “ _You wait, when my boyfriend gets here_ – “

 

“Sally, why do you gotta break the things I get you?” a new voice asked, and another hoverboard floated into view with a rush of exhaust, bearing a green guy with long black hair. He peered down at the quartet, eyeing Marion and Kamala curiously. “Hey, you guys been on a…recruitment thing drive just like us. We got all affirmative action, hired some ladies. Way too much testosterone floating around, you know?”

 

“At least you’re with the times,” Kamala said, and Miles held an arm out.

 

“ _Careful_ ,” he said. “ _These guys are bad news_.”

 

“He’s right,” the Green Goblin said with a sheepish smile at Kamala. “We’re…we’re bad people that like doing bad things. Isn’t that right, Demogoblin?”

 

“We’re the worst,” another voice said as a paler goblin floated in on another hoverboard, careening to a stop next to the Green Goblin. “We got the chopper working, Green. Shipment’s on the way back.”

 

“Then all that’s left is the fighting part, right?” Green Goblin said, leering at Miles, and his spider sense clanged. “Sorry, I’m new to this whole supervillain thing.”

 

“ _We could just skip that part, and you repent your wicked ways_?” Miles asked, and the Green Goblin let a sharp laugh, grinning widely with his yellowed teeth.

 

“That’s, uh…cute, but a no-go, pal,” he said. “No, you’re gonna try to stop us and ‘haul us in’ or whatever, and we’re gonna disagree, and it’s gonna turn violent.”

 

“ _We’ve got a pretty good track record with violent_ ,” Miles said, Kamala growing her fists into those meaty basketball-sized mitts next to him.

 

“Records were made to be broken,” the Green Goblin said, slowly drifting lower. “Records, streaks…bones….”

 

Miles’s spider-sense was suddenly screaming in his head as the goblin lunged forward at him, and his powerful legs carried him backward while he watched Kamala backhand the goblin, sending him flying. He cackled and rolled to a landing, clambering to his feet.

 

“C’mon, let’s tussle!” he said. “Ladies?”

 

“I’m good for round two,” the pink girl said. Miles hadn’t noticed her regain consciousness, but she looked awake and well…and pretty upset at Marion. Marion was glaring right back, shifting his weight in a twitchy battle-ready stance.

 

“ _Have at thee_!” he said, surging forward. Ganke, meanwhile, was dodging explosions from the Demogoblin, webbing his hands up to muffle the actual detonations and dodging away from the ones that got through. The Iron Goblin had extricated itself from Ganke’s webs and was staring down with glowing yellow eyes at Kamala, who had embiggened to a size suitable to fighting a massive suit of armor.

 

“ _So, that leaves us_ ,” Miles said, squaring off with the Green Goblin, who nodded.

 

“Hey, you know what? Good luck,” he said. “I’m not…really out to kill anyone. Well…one person. But I mean, survival of the fittest, right? You kill me, you’re probably doing the world a favor, and I kill you, well…I got a goal, you’re trying to stop me, right?”

 

“ _Kinda sick way of looking at it, but hey, crazy people gotta be crazy_ ,” Miles said, and the goblin cackled madly at him.

 

“I’m glad someone has it figured out!” he said, and Miles’s spider sense clanged again in his head, sending him leaping away as the goblin lunged at him. He held his hands down and fired his webs, but the goblin was quick, darting away and hopping on his hoverboard to zoom upward, intercepting Miles as he descended. He collided, and Miles felt a lance of pain along his back as the goblin gripped him.

 

“I’m so sorry for the cliché, but…going down!” he shouted, the hoverboard careening downward. Miles tried to break free, but the goblin’s grip was like steel. It was strange, dealing with someone that could actually hold him back, match him for strength. Miles wasn’t as strong as Harry or even as Peter, but he was still superhumanly powerful. Fighting someone just as strong was…a little scary, actually.

 

_Kr-Crash!_

 

Miles collided with the ground, the road crackling with his impact. A crater formed around him, and he saw the hole he had left fill the edges of his vision as the goblin reared a claw back.

 

“I’m really sorry about this, but I gotta leave a message!” he said. “Nothing personal!”

 

“ _We don’t do voicemail_!” Miles said, webbing up the Goblin’s wrist and attaching it to a distant light pole. The web was pulled taut, and the goblin strained long enough for Miles to roll onto his back, his freshly-opened wounds protesting with the jagged rocks under him. He tucked his knees into his chin and kicked up into the goblin’s chest with all his might.

 

_Crunch!_

 

“Weeee!” the goblin cackled as he sailed out of sight, spinning through the air. Miles staggered to his feet, his suit feeling slippery against his back as he crawled up out of the hole, peering around. The fight had split up, and he could only see Kamala beating the tar out of the Iron Goblin with fists the size of minivans. He staggered forward, his spider sense buzzing as the hoverboard behind him took to the sky. He turned and watched it soar upward, and a sense of dread filled him as it zipped back down carrying the Green Goblin, who was rattling out a peal of laughter.

 

“Wow, you…you got me good on that one,” he said, rotating slowly on the spot, his glowing yellow eyes fixed on Miles the entire time. “I think I actually felt some of my ribs puncture some organs. But, uh…it’s okay. I’m sturdy, you know? I can take a hit.”

 

He zipped forward on his glider, and Miles’s spider sense sounded just soon enough for him to lunge away, his back protesting angrily to the sudden movement. He felt the goblin’s claws graze his chest as spun away, sending fresh lines of hot pain blooming along his skin. This guy was fast, faster than anyone he’d ever dealt with before. His spider sense seemed to be struggling to keep up. He spun as the goblin rounded on his hoverboard, claws spread in a gesture of invitation that was definitely uninviting.

 

“Hugs!” he shouted, speeding towards Miles, who crouched like he was ready to jump again before feinting and ducking under one of the goblin’s arms, curling two fingers in on his palm.

 

_Zzt-SHAFF!_

“Gyah!” the Goblin shouted out with a chuckle as he spun wildly out of control, careening around and brandishing his claws once more. “Oh, that was…tingly!”

 

“ _C’mere, I’ll give you another_ ,” Miles said, acutely aware of how every movement caused his costume to slide along his back. He was losing a bit more blood than he was comfortable with, and his chest was now getting uncomfortably slippery.

 

_Shink!_

 

“Oh, someone got distracted!” the Green Goblin said gleefully, and Miles looked down to see a long claw protruding through his shoulder before it shrank back into him and slid out of his back. He felt a numb sensation spread in the shoulder itself, likely adrenaline pulsing through him to numb the pain in some kind of fight or flight effort. He stumbled away, but he felt his spider sense buzzing faintly again. Rounding, he saw the goblin lunging forward, time seeming to slow down as he raised his bloodstained claws again, likely for a killing blow. Could he jump away? His legs felt weak, shaky. His whole body was starting to feel sluggish. Had he lost that much blood? Probably. If he was a bit more aware, he would probably be more terrified of his impending death.

 

At the moment, he just felt tired….

 

“No!” a voice shouted, and a giant hand filled Miles’s vision, smacking the Green Goblin away again, sending him flying into the sky. An equally enormous foot stomped on the hoverboard left behind, and there was Kamala, shrinking down to a normal size. Her eyes were wide, brimming with tears behind her domino mask as she peered at Miles. “Oh…oh, no…. Hey, Mi…um…Ricochet? C’mon, stay with me!”

 

Miles felt hands on his shoulders, and he blearily opened his eyes. When had he closed them? He was so tired.

 

“Miles?” Kamala asked softly. “Please, talk to me, okay?”

 

“It’s Ricochet, c’mon,” Miles said, his voice limp, each word taking a supreme effort to form. Was his mask off? He felt cool air on his lips, but his HUD was still…in front of one of his eyes. His mask must have gotten torn up at some point.

 

“Okay, Ricochet,” Kamala said in a soft voice. “Just…keep talking to me, okay? Um…Spidercide!? Help!”

 

“ _Of course_!” the familiar voice of Marion came, and Miles heard his voice close by. “ _No, no, fallen comrade, dearest friend, help heal, help him mend_.”

 

“What do we do?” Kamala asked, silent for a moment before gasping. “No, Miles, eyes open, alright?”

 

Miles tugged his eyes back open, but it was quite an effort. Kamala looked so worried as she gazed down at him, her brown eyes wide with concern. She was…well, she was pretty amazing. Miles had only known her for a day or so, but she had already shown herself to be…just a good person. Even before she’d met up with the rest of the Watch, she had been making an effort to save the day, to be a hero in her own right.

 

And she had this smile that she would send at Miles that made his heart leap.

 

“Look at me, okay?” Kamala said, and Miles smiled up at her. She blushed and smiled back before glancing over Miles’s head at something. “Phage? Phage, what do we do?”

 

“Oh…oh, fuck,” Ganke said, and Miles could tell he’d pulled his mask off. The fight must have been over, then. At least they’d won or fought off the bad guys. “Um…Marion, go get Mayday, or like…head-shout for her or something.”

 

“No need!” a new voice said, and suddenly, a blue-eyed face framed by sandy-blonde hair filled Miles’s vision, and he felt his mind being tugged back into awareness even as the pain from his wounds seemed to fade into the background. “Miles, can you hear me?”

 

“Loud and clear,” Miles said with a blink, staring up at her.

 

“Okay, just…just don’t move, okay?” Mayday said. “There’s a camp nearby with a medical pavilion. Just…I’m gonna make them not pay too much attention to your face, so you just keep quiet, and let them make you better, okay?”

 

“Sure thing,” Miles said. “Kamala?”

 

“I’m here,” Kamala said, and Miles felt a hand in his hair. “I’m not leaving you.”

 

“Ganke?”

 

“Right here, bro,” Ganke said. “Not going anywhere.”

 

Well, if his friends were here, he could handle anything.

 

……

 

He couldn’t handle this anymore.

 

Frank had based his entire career, his whole image as a vigilante, on the idea that sometimes sacrifices had to be made, that the greater good was worth him being seen as a bit of a crackpot. Let them see the Punisher as some kind of crazy, someone little better than the villains he spent his nights beating to a pulp. He could stand some bad press if New York came out of it in a better state.

 

Despite his best efforts, though, New York was at her worst. The city was falling apart around him, descending into utter anarchy, and he had nothing to show for it but his best efforts. If his best efforts were turning out a New York no better than if he’d done nothing, he might as well have simply given up before he started.

 

What would Maria think? What would Lisa tell him if she saw that his attempts at fixing the world that had taken them from him had turned up nothing?

 

If only he could talk to them, just one last time.

 

“I just wanna hear your voices again,” he said, more to himself than anyone.

 

Even so, he heard a reply.

 

“Aw, that’s touching,” a voice of pure shadows said, worming into his ears. “I’m touched, really. You just want to hear their voices again. Dearest Maria. Sweet little Lisa.”

 

Frank rounded and saw a man standing in the street. He surely hadn’t been there moments ago; Frank made it a point to learn his surroundings as fast as possible, and the street he had been meandering along had been completely abandoned.

 

No one got by him.

 

“Who the hell are you?” Frank asked, tensing, his hand reaching for his sidearm. The man was tall, taller than Frank by a good few inches, and he looked to be in his forties, with salt-and-pepper hair slicked back along his scalp. His chin ended in similarly-colored goatee, and a black mustache curled down to join it. Something about him just didn’t sit right with Frank. He was almost unnaturally tall, with eyes darker than coals and skin the color of chalk. He also seemed to know things about Frank’s family that he shouldn’t, a fact that had Frank on edge more so than usual.

 

“I’m…well, I’m what you might call an…avenging angel,” the man said, stepping forward with inhuman grace to pause in front of the Frank. “A spirit of vengeance, even. I’m here to help you, Frank.”  


“And how would you do that?” Frank asked, his eyes fixing on the stranger with the utmost skepticism. It was a tall tale, for sure, but given what had been happening the past couple days, Frank was willing to hear him out.

 

The stranger grinned, and despite the warmth of the day, Frank felt a chill shuddering down his spine.

 

“I would ask you,” the man said, walking a slow circle around Frank, “to be my Rider. You would have the power to truly make a difference, to truly take vengeance against the criminal scum of the world. And you would get to hear your family’s voices again. A win-win, really.”

 

“What’s the catch?” Frank asked, folding his arms, his eyes following the man’s progress. There was always a catch, especially when promised what amounted to all of your hopes and dreams come true. But if even half of what this guy was telling him was true, he owed it to Maria, to Lisa, to at least look into it.

 

“All you have to do is show your usual lack of mercy,” the man said with a grin bordering on feral. “You will be imbued with the powers necessary to truly achieve your goals. For the longest time, you’ve been doing your very best, making a difference in spite of being nothing more than an admittedly exemplary specimen of human being. Work with me, and you’ll have the power to truly strike fear into criminal scum, to do what it takes to eliminate crime. Even if it means eliminating _criminals_.”

 

“Oh, I’m pretty good at that,” Frank said with a smirk, and the man smiled a cold smile right back.

 

“That’s why I sought you out,” he said, holding his hand out. “Will you help me. Will you be my Rider?”

 

Frank sighed, looking at the man’s hand. He was promising a pretty sweet deal, and honestly, if all he was gonna do was shake on it, Frank could back out later on if he turned out to be some kinda crazy, right?

 

“Yeah, alright, let’s do this,” he said, reaching out to take the man’s hand.

 

It wasn’t like he was making a deal with the devil, right?

 

……

 

Alex sometimes wished he’d never gotten these powers. He hadn’t agreed to them; he’d never wanted to be a superhero or some kind of crime-fighting vigilante. He just wanted to be regular Alex Power on the basketball team, maybe date a cheerleader and be a normal kid. But being on the basketball team now just seemed like cheating, and he was afraid that any girl he tried dating would find out about his powers and out him or call him a freak, or worse, connect him to Julie and the Neighborhood Watch and out _them_. At this point, he might as well just cut his losses and go back to the Watch, be a superhero. But he didn’t want to spend every moment either struggling to keep his grades up or running himself ragged dragging New York city out of trouble every ten minutes the way Julie always seemed to be.

 

These days, it seemed New York was determined to keep itself in trouble, a fact Alex was acutely aware of as he hunkered down in the gymnasium of his school with the rest of his neighborhood. Outside, the city was falling apart, and the rule of the game for civilians was hide and wait to be evacuated. SHIELD was out in full force, with aerial transports the size of houses ready to clear people out, and the Army was storming the city, fighting back the looters and rioters.

 

This left the normies to just sit and wait.

 

“Alex,” Kate said, smiling as she made her way over to settle onto the bleachers next to him. “I hoped I’d find you. I was worried.”

 

“Hey, Kate,” Alex said, smiling up at her.

 

Kate Bishop was probably his best friend at school, and even over the summer, they’d kept in contact and met up a couple of times for “dates” of a sort. Kate favored a punkish look, with a sharp pink highlight in her dark brown hair, a faux-leather jacket, and skirts with a hint of lacey frills. She was cute, but something about her always gave Alex the willies, like a little buzz in the back of his head telling him to keep his distance.

 

That was a shame; she definitely had a thing for him.

 

“This is insane, isn’t it?” Kate asked, staring out over the crowded gym. “Even by New York standards, this is…a whole other level of fucked up.”

 

“It’s definitely the craziest thing I’ve ever seen,” Alex said with a sigh. Julie and her friends were out there saving the city, patrolling the streets, and busting their asses, and here he was, with his costume tucked away in his backpack, waiting to be flown out of the city.

 

“At least we’re safe,” Kate said. “One of the SHIELD guys said the ship is landing now, and then we’re out of here.”

 

“Yeah,” Alex said, feeling more and more like a coward. “Hey, I’m gonna go hit the bathroom real quick.”

 

“Sure,” Kate said, smiling at him as he stood and made his way to the locker rooms, his bag slung over his shoulder.

 

He stepped into the empty room, glancing around at the familiar lockers. How many basketball practices had he prepared for in this very room, how many games had he psyched himself up for? Then he’d gotten bitten, and games were just too easy, like turning on God Mode in Skyrim or playing a New Game Plus.

 

There was no challenge, just hollow victories.

 

He sighed and made his way to a stall, stepping in and taking care of business. Glancing at his bag, he contemplated the costume inside. Julie and her pals wore theirs under their clothes most of the time, in case of a sudden need for crime-fighting. Given the circumstances….

 

“Damn it,” he grumbled to himself, sliding out of his clothing and pulling on the skintight costume. How did the Neighborhood Watch handle having this sort of clingy fabric hugging them at all times? The suit clung to him in all the most uncomfortable of ways, riding up especially in his –

 

_Crash!_

 

_Crack-KOOM!_

 

“Someone help!”

 

Jeez, were these costumes cursed? Five seconds wearing it, and trouble was afoot. Pulling the mask over his face, he ran for the exit that lead back to the gym, jumping briefly as a flash of white blotted out his vision before his HUD appeared. Right, there was a whole overlay Peter Parker had designed into all of their masks.

 

Hopefully there weren’t twenty minutes of software updates to worry about.

 

He hurried out to the gym to see a truly terrifying sight. The refugees were all hurrying away from an invading force of about a couple dozen…well, they looked like some freakish combination of flesh and machine, mostly metallic plating but with a disturbingly reddish pink sinew instead of an endoskeleton. It was like the metal exterior had been fused to flesh, and not neatly, either. They were hunched creatures with digitigrade legs, like a gargoyle, but instead of wings sprouting from their backs, four spiderlike legs ticked along the ground, carrying them and then depositing them on the ground when they needed to lash out with their overlong arms.

 

“ _What the fuck_?” he breathed into his voice modulator. He hurried forward, taking in the situation. The fleeing civilians were still far enough away from the weird flesh-bots that there was a sizable gap between the two, meaning he could probably rig up a makeshift web trip-line on the fly. Taking aim, he held out his hands.

 

_Thwip-thwip!_

 

The robots ran straight into the web and collided, piling into each other in a mess of metal limbs. Of course, they focused on the source of the webbing and saw him, and Alex’s spider sense shouted in his head as they tore toward him instead, moving alarmingly fast.

 

“ _Right_ ,” he said, leaping and webbing onto the ceiling of the gym, yanking himself up over the crowd. He clung onto the rafters, and the crawly things below shrieked at him, a sound that would probably haunt his nightmares for a little while. They broke away from the scrum that had formed below him, crawling toward the walls. Their spidery legs gripped the cinderblock, and soon, Alex was watching the truly horrifying sight of these spiderlings clambering over each other as they scaled upward and skittered along the ceiling, fleshy maws full of metal teeth gnashing at him.

 

“ _Fuck, you’re ugly_ ,” Alex said, hanging by his knees and aiming his arms out.

 

_Thwip-thwip-thwip-thwip-thwip-thwip!_

 

He webbed up a bunch of them, wrapping their legs up, their arms, whatever he could, and no longer able to move, the robots plummeted to the gym floor with solid impacts that left the wood splintered and cratered.  He was actually making a decent amount of progress.

 

Until Kate came back.

 

“Alex!?” her voice called, and Alex glanced down to see her with a girl he recognized as a friend of hers. Rini or something. “Alex, are you in here!?”

 

The spider-bot things noticed her and immediately scuttled to converge on her, and Alex leapt from the ceiling, webbing onto it and swinging down to land in front of the pair.

 

“ _You two need to get the hell out of here_!” he shouted. “ _Go_!”

 

“Who are you?”

 

“ _I’m, uh…Powerhouse_ ,” he said, remembering the name he’d been thinking of back when he’d first gotten these powers.

 

“Listen, my friend never made it out – “

 

“ _The blond kid_ ,” Alex interrupted her. “ _I got him out just before these guys showed up, and now you need to_ – “

 

“Look out!” Rini or Kyrie said. Seriously, what was her name? Alex’s spider sense sounded in his head, and he grabbed Kate, slinging her over his shoulder and snagging up Really’s wrist to pull her along. The spider bots scrabbled along behind them, and Alex unceremoniously dumped Kate on her feet on the other side of the gym doors, pushing Rini along with her.

 

“ _Get to safety_!” he shouted, slamming the doors and webbing them shut, dodging away from another hit from the spider things. He turned and saw that there was a veritable horde of them surrounding him. If he tried to get out of the way, they might power through the doors and go after Kate and the others. He’d have to stand his ground.

 

He didn’t even _want_ to be a superhero; now he was making a heroic sacrifice?

 

“Maybe not just yet,” a new voice said, and suddenly, there was a redheaded girl next to him, floating down a landing surrounded by a purple aura. She had bright green eyes and the kind of smile that Alex hated because it was so easy to crush on such a girl. The girl let a small giggle, but they didn’t have much time to talk, as a commotion from the other end of the robot horde drew their attention.

 

“Let’s fuck these guys up!” another voice shouted as a disk-shaped projectile flew through the mob, colliding and bouncing off of a few dozen heads and sending the robots crumping to the ground. It rebounded and flew back into the grip of a girl in yellow armor with a shiny pink facemask. Her feet were adorned with two more disks that seemed to serve as wheels, allowing her to spin through the crowd and whack more heads.

 

“Right behind you, Go-Go!”

 

_Sploop-sploop!_

 

“ _The hell_?” Alex muttered as one of the robots lunged at the one called Go-Go before being engulfed by a viscous blue liquid that hardened, trapping it in place. Several more of the creepy-crawlies were treated to the same fate, trapped under some sort of…goo that hardened quickly, pinning them in place. The source appeared to be a girl in pink armor similar to Go-Go’s, though with a skirt for flair. Her facemask was a greenish teal color, hiding her face as well. The goo was coming from twin wrist-mounted cannons that she trained on any robot left moving.

 

Before long, the situation was effectively defused, the pair making quick work of the robots. Heavy footfalls sounded, and a massive suit of white armor similar to the Iron Goblin that Alex remembered seeing on TV made its way in, standing amid the carnage with its heavy metal hands on its hips.

 

“ _Not bad, you two_ ,” a modulated voice came from it. “ _Vision, anything on them_?”

 

A waifish girl about Alex’s age meandered out from behind one of the armor’s legs, peering about at the robots. She was petite, with pale skin and white hair and dark onyx eyes. She wore a black and white jumpsuit of sorts with bright red accents, and behind her, a suit of what was unmistakably Stark armor followed.

 

“They seem to have a kind of hivemind thing going on,” the girl said. “But it’s strange. I’ve never seen a network so…sophisticated. They’re like…synapses, like they’re all part of one single brain. Like…ants or bees or something.”

 

“So where’s the queen?” the redheaded girl near Alex asked.

 

“I…can’t tell,” Vision said. “They have some kind of…firewall or something. Even I can’t break through it. It’s like it’s adapting. When I think I’m in, it just pushes me right back out.”

 

“This is getting weirder the further we go down the rabbit hole,” Go-Go said, peering over at Alex. “Who are you?”

 

“He’s part of the Neighborhood Watch,” the redhead said, smiling over at him. “I’m Jean Grey. That’s Go-Go, Honey Lemon, Baymax, and – “

 

“FREDZILLA!” a huge voice shouted, and they all jumped as the south wall of the gym collapsed in, a huge purple Godzilla thing crashing through and belting out an earsplitting roar. “Here to save the—oh, wait, we’re done. My bad.”

 

“We’re Big Hero 6,” Jean Grey said, her voice a mixture of exasperation and amusement. “We can pay for that wall.”

 

……

 

“They will pay for this!” Osnick shouted. “How dare they dismantle my creations!”

 

“Oliver, that’s not important right now,” Kaine said with a shake of his head, turning away from the tracking relay and peering out at their bunker. “What happened? The Delta Series should have been able to distinguish between an actual threat and civilians. Why did they attack?”

 

“I…don’t know,” Osnick said. “By rights, the IFF chip should be functioning perfectly, but…it keeps rewriting itself, changing its parameters. It’s managed to deactivate itself a couple of times.”

 

“You can’t fix it?” Kaine asked, and Osnick sighed.

 

“The Delta Series is controlled by a central unit, one of the most sophisticated computers known to man,” he said. “It’s created from a vitrified brain, allowing for unparalleled complexity. The way it’s rewriting itself on the fly like this is reminiscent of actual brain activity, but it should be impossible for it still be capable of…well, thought.”

 

“And what are you basing that on?” Kaine asked slowly. Osnick turned to him, his black goggles reflecting Kaine’s face, showing Kaine his own hardened expression.

 

“I…simply assumed it,” Osnick said. “It was only logical that – “

 

“That’s _his_ hubris speaking,” Kaine snapped, stalking over to the control console and tapping a few keys, his many hands flying over the keyboard, but he only got a password prompt. He typed in the password, earning an error screen. “Oh.”

 

“ _Yes, ‘oh’_ ,” came a voice from the computer. “ _It would seem my creations have gone astray. Perhaps it’s time for a stern reprimand from Father_.”

 

The door to the lab opened, and a robotic hand clamped onto the frame, furry mitts tipped with menacing claws.

 

“ _Did you forget about the Beta Series_?” the voice asked as a robotic creature stumbled in, looking not unlike some kind of anthropomorphized dog, though with glowing yellow eyes and jagged teeth, meant to appeal to a young audience that enjoyed “creepy” animatronic puppets.

 

“Whose brain was it that you used for these things?” Kained asked, and Osnick sighed.

 

“Otto Octavius.”

 

……

 

“Who?”

 

“Yeah, he was some kinda science type, but he zapped his brain and went completely nuts. Replaced his prosthetic legs with these like crab things, and I think he lost his arms later on and built like four more. Eight limbs.”

 

“Doctor Octopus.”

 

“Exactly.”

 

Martin shifted in his cell, moving to a more comfortable position as the SHIELD agents chattered on nearby. Outside, the small camp was quiet. Night was falling, the sun dipping below the horizon and casting long shadows across the asphalt outside. The warm summer air was dry, and even with New York in its current state of panic, the thick smell of the city was still ever-present, fresher than ever now that the strange blue mist had fully dissipated.

 

The mist. When Martin had first breathed it in, he’d felt nothing more than a dizzy spell before moving on, trying to make his way through the crowds to find his girlfriend, but police were blocking him at first, and then the military, trying to section off people, to maintain their order with no regard as to what the people themselves wanted. Martin didn’t want out. He didn’t want to leave New York, he just wanted to find Paige and protect her. Even now, he had no idea whether she was okay, whether she was safe, or whether the chaos had spread to her neck of the Bronx.

 

Before he had been able to get to her, the music had played.

 

It had been the strangest sensation. The weird newscaster, Edpool, had decided that what New York had needed was some Guns and Roses blasted at top volume all over Times Square. The beat…the beat had been infectious. It had wormed its way into Martin’s ears, his skull, filling his being, empowering him, making him grow, change into…something. After that, everything had been a blur up until he’d awoken in his cell in this SHIELD encampment.

 

He felt rather certain he’d done something stupid, though. He remembered feeling…powerful. Amazingly powerful. Whatever strange effect the music had had on him, it had apparently resulted in a lot of problems for SHIELD.

 

Martin was just considering a nap when a voice sounded on the edge of his hearing, growing louder by the second.

 

“…et’s blasting off agaaaaaiiiiin!”

 

_CRUNCH!_

 

A sickening noise came from just outside his cell, the sound of a body impacting the ground at high speed, and the two SHIELD agents scrambled to their feet, hurrying toward the crumpled form of a green-skinned man with limp black hair that splayed around his head as he lay on the ground, a heap of shattered bones wrapped in scaly skin.

 

“Holy shit, guy, are you okay?” one of the SHIELD guys asked.

 

“Hands in the air!” the other said, aiming his gun at the green fellow, who began to shift around, loud snapping sounds coming from his broken body.

 

“Ugh, typical,” he grumbled in a gravelly voice, his words punctuated by the occasional grinding crunch as his bones shifted and apparently knitted themselves back together. “Fella falls from the sky, ‘Hands in the air’, like I can even fucking move my arms. By the way I can’t.”

 

“What’s your name?” one of the agents asked.

 

“Aw, hell, you’re gonna be dead in like fourteen seconds anyway, whatta you care?” the green guy asked, and faster than Martin could track, he was standing, and his claws were swiping at the agent with the gun, leaving huge gash marks across his chest. The guard staggered and fell to the ground, and the green man was a blur after that, tearing through the squad of SHIELD agents assigned to the camp. The response was admirable, most of the soldiers converging on the goblin within seconds of his killing of the armed man, but the goblin was just too fast, and even when they managed to hit him, he soaked up bullets like it was his job. He snagged up any soldier that got close to him, impaling them on his claws, and the ones that shot at him were swiftly dispatched as well, the goblin shrugging off any amount of gunfire and closing the distance to…well make use of his claws.

 

He seemed to favor those.

 

It was over in two minutes flat, the goblin standing in the middle of a circle of corpses, staring around them with a quirked eyebrow.

 

“Not sure what other outcome you were expecting,” he said to them before glancing around the camp and spotting Martin. “Oh, hey there.”

 

He made his way over, crouching and gripping the bars to Martin’s cell, yanking the entire door free.

 

“Hey,” he said again. “Hey, what’s, uh…what’s up? I’m the Green Goblin. What’re ya in for, pal?”

 

“I’m Martin Louis,” Martin introduced himself as he made his way out of the cell, trying not to look at the carnage around them. “I…well…I can’t really explain it, but…when I listen to music, like…good music, I just…I get out of control. I think I did some serious damage last time. Like I turned into this…thing, this monster.”

 

“So, uh…good music makes you into a huge jam-monster,” the Green Goblin said, his face splitting into a manic grin. “That’s…that’s, uh…. Welcome to the Runaways, bud.”

 

……

 

“ _The Runaways! That’s what they’re calling themselves!_ ” Edpool shouted from the TV. “ _They were the Frightful Four when they were just the guys, and then they got two more members, called themselves the Sinister Six! And now they’re just going around, busting into SHIELD detainment camps and freeing the prisoners that they like and just killing the rest. Which is just…totally mean, right!? And they’re tough. They hospitalized one of senpai’s friends, and poor Spider-Dan had to come back and get a new camera after they blew him up! Watch out for these guys_!”

 

“Yeah, that would have been nice to know about…two hours ago,” Riley said, and Johnny couldn’t help but agree. They had just gotten an update from Mayday saying that Miles had been stabilized and was being taken into SHIELD custody for medical treatment, but it had been touch and go for a while. The Green Goblin had really messed him up. “Harry, no rush, but I could really go for an omelet.”

 

“Working on it,” Harry said, glancing about at the kitchen of the apartment they’d sort of taken over as a campsite in the middle of SoHo. “The gas lines are still working, but the power’s out, so Jujube had to make a tiny explosion to light the burner. Omelets in ten, promise.”

 

“Don’t let me get in the way of your culinary genius,” Riley said, and Johnny couldn’t believe he hadn’t worked it out sooner. Riley really was just Peter Parker in a girl’s body. Of course, he would never point that out, because Riley was also probably very sensitive about that fact. Now that he was looking for it, though, Johnny couldn’t help but notice the resemblance, the obvious similarities in their speech and mannerisms. It was almost uncanny.

 

“Johnny, you alright?” Riley asked, and Johnny realized he’d been staring. He looked away from Riley’s bright blue eyes, shaking his head.

 

“Yeah, I’m good,” he said with a grin. “Just jealous; I wanted the first omelet.”

 

“Sorry, I’ve got connections,” Riley said, and Johnny snorted.

 

“And here I thought you would use those to hook a brother up,” he said.

 

“See, normally, I would,” Riley admitted, “but I’m just really hungry.”

 

“Such greedy,” Johnny said. “Much inconsiderate.”

 

“Wow,” Riley said, and Johnny snorted. Riley smiled at him, a wide grin that was admittedly somewhat charming even from Peter but was downright adorable on Riley. Again, Johnny chided himself for not noticing the similarities before, but he comforted himself with the knowledge that a mysterious cousin with identical mannerisms was slightly less improbable then gender-swapped clone with some weird manner of brain-copy.

 

How had his life become so strange?

 

“Johnny?” Riley asked, and Johnny looked away again. “Look, I know it’s weird and I picked like the worst time to tell everyone – “

 

“Uh, guys,” Cindy said from next to Riley pointing back to the TV screen, where Edpool was gone and had been replaced by…well, it looked a bit like Pete but with a couple extra sets of arms and some major pre-beard scruff on his face. A trickle of blood was running down his cheek, and in the background, a ruined laboratory was going up in smoke.

 

“ _People of New York_ ,” the face on the screen said. “ _My name is Kaine, and you must listen to me. It was I that set off the bombs that brought this whole mess about. It was I that released the blue mist that gave so many of you your powers. And to those whose lives were ruined by my…foolhardy plan, I apologize. I only meant to establish a new world where citizens governed themselves, where empowerment lead to responsibility. But so many of you…so many of you are true heroes and only want the best, but so many more would step over each other, tear your fellow man down so that you may take the easy path to your dreams. If any of the latter are watching this, you deserve only a swift and painful demise, one that may come sooner than you think._ ”

“What the hell?” Riley asked.

“ _Earlier today, I lost control of my defense array, the rather…unsightly robots you may have seen attempting to help maintain order_ ,” Kaine went on. _“While their efforts could be called a bit…overzealous, they only ever wanted to defend innocent citizens from those that would harm them. Unfortunately, the central control unit has gained sentience and gone rogue. It intends to detonate the robots. It…will succeed. I cannot stop it. I can only delay it, and…I fear I won’t be long for this world_.”

 

As if to emphasize his point, a loud slamming sound came from the nearby wall, which shook from the impact. Kaine ignored it, his blue eyes staring intensely out at his watchers.

 

“ _I only wanted to help_ ,” he said softly. “ _To change the world for the better, to usher in a new age. I see now that I was blinded by…by my own selfish agendas. I will do what I can to forestall the destruction, but I urge anyone watching this. If you have any sense, run. Run fast, run far, and don’t look back. And to my…my brothers, to my sister. You’ve done so much for everyone else. I beg you, escape while you can_.”

 

The sound of another loud collision came from behind Kaine, punctuated by a distant explosion, and the feed cut out. In seconds, Edpool was back on the screen, and though his mask was covering his face, Johnny could tell he was stunned.

 

“ _Uh…we’ll be right back_ ,” he said, standing and sending his chair flying as he ran offscreen. “ _Bob! We’re doing the dramatic climax, get the fu –_ “

 

The camera shook briefly before the screen went to the standby logo of Channel Fourteen.

 

“We gotta go,” Riley said immediately, standing and hurrying to the kitchen. “Harry! We’re out of here!”

 

“What, what’s going on?” Harry asked as Riley dragged him into the living room, a confused Jubilee ambling after them.

 

“New York’s about to get carpet-bombed or something,” Riley said, pulling her mask on. Johnny did the same and heard her voice coming over the intercom, sending a mass-call to the entire Watch. “ _Did everyone just hear that_?”

 

“ _Yeah, Edpool jacked every screen in Times Square, so Kaine was on them, too_ ,” Lana said. “ _A Group is all accounted for_.”

 

“ _C Group is already in a medical pavilion, and it’s looking like evac is high on the priority list_ ,” Flash said. “ _Don’t worry about us, guys_.”

 

“ _So, how are we getting out of here_?” Jess asked, her voice tinged with a hint of nervousness, and Johnny looked over to see Riley placing her hands to her forehead in the same gesture Pete always did when a problem just smacked him in the face like this.

 

“ _Scarlet, incoming_ ,” Harry said, pointing down the road, where about a dozen of those freaky robot things were scuttling toward them on their four spider-legs. Johnny was just unfurling his wingsuit when Jubilee stepped forward.

 

“ _Got ‘em_ ,” she said, holding her hands out. Bright green and blue ribbons of light smeared out of her hands with a soft _paff_ sound, zipping toward the robots. The lights floated in their midst for a second before….

 

_SHOOM!_

 

Johnny took a moment to cover the group with a translucent barrier as debris rained down upon them, the mangled bots blown to bits. When the smoke cleared, Harry was staring down at Jubilee, and though his mask hid his expression, Johnny was sure there was a beatific grin on his face as he squeezed his girlfriend.

 

“ _Have I told you lately how amazingly sexy you are_?” he asked, and Jubilee laughed softly into her mask.

 

“ _You could stand to bring it up more often_ ,” she said, glancing over at Riley. “ _Do we have a plan_?”

 

Johnny watched Riley, and he knew what was going through her head. She was a hero; she didn’t want to just cut and run. She was too much like Peter. Still…what could they do? At this point, the name of the game would be an emergency evacuation, and at best, they would be able to scramble among New York and help as many people as they could. At that point, though, it would be better to just leave it to the military. When there was no time limit, they could be careful, help refugees to camps and leave it at that. Now, every second would be a scramble; they would probably be more in the way than actually helping.

 

“ _We’ll have to pull out of here as soon as we can_ ,” Gwen’s voice said, and Riley tensed. “ _If we don’t,_ we’re _the ones that’ll be in danger._ ”

 

As quickly as she had seemed to be preparing for a rebuttal, Riley slumped at the same time Johnny heard Pete sigh over the comm. Julie walked over to Riley and slid her hands down her forearm to take Riley’s hand.

 

“ _It’s time to go, Riley_ ,” she said. “ _We did good. We did all we could. But this is for the military_.”

 

Even as she said this, the distant whine of engines sounded on the edge of their hearing, and they all looked up to see a quinjet flying into view, growing rapidly from a dot on the horizon to a massive ship that hovered overhead with a loud rush. A spotlight beamed down onto them, cutting through the evening gloom.

 

“ _Members of the Neighborhood Watch,_ ” a voice called from the loudspeakers, one that Johnny sort of recognized. “ _This is Agent Phil Coulson. We politely request that you come with us for immediate evac_.”

 

The quinjet came in low, hovering a foot above the ground as a hatch opened in the side, lowering down into a staircase. A balding, nondescript man in his thirties hurried out and ushered them in.

 

“We don’t have a whole lot of time,” he said blithely. “I would appreciate if it you got in quickly.”

 

“ _What about Spidey and –_ “

 

“Agent Barnes is supervising their evacuation as we speak,” Coulson cut across Harry, who just nodded and gestured for Jubilee and Riley to get on the jet. Julie took Riley’s wrist and dragged her through the hatch, Cindy close behind, while Johnny and Harry took up the rear. The hatch closed behind them, leaving them in the brightly-lit cabin of a ship not unlike the ones he saw his fair share of during his days with the Terrific Trio. Agent Coulson sat in a seat near the door, strapping a crisscross of seatbelts down his shoulders. “You should probably strap in.”

 

They all did so, taking up the rows of seats along either side of the cabin. Johnny sat next to Cindy, who was next to Riley, who had Julie on her other side. Harry and Jubilee took the opposite side, Harry spending a few moments helping Jubilee buckle in. Coulson reached over and gave a small door that probably led to the cockpit two solid taps, and the floor lurched beneath them.

 

And then they were off, into the sky and finally away from all of this madness.

 

……

 

“This is madness!” Gray Goblin shouted, shifting into a pile of shadow as a Mangle bot took a wide swing at him. The robot’s clawed hand phased through his body like it was nothing before Hobgoblin ran up and snagged the whole thing into his hands, ripping it to pieces and tossing them aside.

 

“Madness?” he bellowed. “THIS! IS! HARLEM!”

 

“We’re in the Bronx, big guy, but I appreciate the enthusiasm,” Green Goblin said, his claws flaying a raptor as it ran at him, Martin hunkering down behind him. “I got ya covered, new guy. So, uh…how we coming on getting the Doof Wagon up and running?”

 

The Gray Goblin shook his head. “The battery’s dead,” he told Green Goblin. “We could get it cranking again for a little while, but we’d have to push it. Hob would have no problem with _that_ , but…well, we’re low on clear road right now.”

 

The Green Goblin looked back at Martin for a moment before turning back to the Gray Goblin.

 

“How’s the sound system?” he asked him. The Gray Goblin shrugged, crawling into the cab to tap a few buttons. Seconds later, the opening riff to Thunderstruck by AC-DC was playing at top volume out of the speakers piled into the back of the vehicle. Behind the Green Goblin, their newest addition tensed. “Martin? Ready to jam?”

 

“I’m ready to fucking thrash,” Martin said, his voice lowering several octaves into a growling timbre. When Green Goblin looked back, he saw Martin’s skin had gone pale and gray, almost white, and his hair was lengthening, turning a dark onyx sheen. He blinked, and his eyes were suddenly fully black as well. “Nyargh! I! LOVE! THIS! SONG!”

 

He snarled, baring a set of pitch-black teeth, and tore off down the street, the ground rumbling under his newly-enlarged form. He was huge, even bigger than the Hobgoblin, and he only seemed to grow bulkier as the song picked up. He cleaned the streets like some demented street sweeper, sending robot and mutated lizard alike flying out of the way. When they didn’t hold still long enough for him to get a hold of them, he lifted cars and used them as improvised weapons, slamming them down to flatten his targets.

 

“You’ve been…THUNDERSTRUCK!” he cackled, roaring down the street, shattering windows and setting off car alarms in the distance.

 

“Ah, I knew I had a good feeling about this guy,” Green Goblin said. “Hob, can you give the Doof Wagon a push? We gotta get home before New York goes the way of your Samsung phone, Gray.”

 

“Please don’t remind me of that,” he sighed, climbing the cab and slamming it shut as the Green Goblin clambered into the passenger seat. “C’mon, let’s head back home.”

 

……

 

He’d never had a home.

 

He’d never know a home, either.

 

Osnick was dead, having sacrificed himself to buy Kaine some time, all to help make sure their schemes, their attempts to control the world they were so vehement couldn’t be controlled, didn’t result in any more catastrophe than they had to. Now, he was hunkered down in a small control room, built for just such an occasion, to shut down the Delta Series. Unfortunately, the best he could do was reset the robots themselves. Octavius’s brain was out of his control, so it was a stalemate, Octavius setting off the detonation sequence and starting a five-minute countdown (a buffer Octavius hadn’t been able to get by, thank goodness) before Kaine would reset the robots, which would reboot in seconds only to have their protocols hijacked by Octavius all over again.

 

“ _How long can you keep up this dance, Kaine_?” Octavius taunted him. “ _I have no need for sleep, no distractions. My mind has never been sharper. It’s only a matter of time before I break in there, and you will perish, and New York will burn! This world will burn_.”

 

Kaine’s only reply was to hit the large red ‘Reset’ button on the panel, and all of the blinking lights signifying the Delta Series winked out of existence for a moment before reappearing.

 

“I don’t care if I die,” Kaine said. “If I can ensure my brothers and sister get out alive…well, I wouldn’t bet any money on the whole ‘New York will burn’ thing.”

 

“ _Such sentiment_ ,” Octavius said. “ _Your ‘brothers’, your ‘sister’. You were lab accidents. You were trial runs. In the end, all of you failed me, even your recently-deceased partner. Tragic, really. You two were getting along so well._ ”

 

“Must be such a foreign concept, having a friend, someone you can rely on,” Kaine said, and Octavius chuckled.

 

“ _Are we trading verbal barbs, then_?” he asked. “ _At least I never_ tried _to be anything more or less than my own man. I may have had associates, my Superior Six, but I never fooled myself into thinking they were more than simply associates. You, with your ‘brothers’, your ‘daughters’. Your departed ‘Osnick’, who you strung up like a puppet and made pretend was your compatriot, like a child with an imaginary friend_.”

 

“No,” Kaine said. “I knew what I had in him, and that was very little. But I wasn’t talking about myself. Friends, people you can rely on. A family found and forged. That’s the reason you won’t succeed. You don’t understand what it means to be able to truly rely on others.”

 

The door burst in, and a Delta Series stalked in, leering at him.

 

“And you think I’ll fall to the ‘power of friendship’?” it asked in a shriek, ticking toward him on four spider legs. “Your forebear is a stumbling child, swinging around and making a spectacle of himself. Do you think he can stand against me?”

 

“Not alone,” Kaine said, leaning against the console and smacking the red button one last time. The Delta in front of him crumbled to the ground, and Kaine hurried from the room, leaping up and clinging to the ceiling, scrambling along it. “But Peter Parker will never be alone.”

 

……

 

I really think I could just use some time alone. Or partially alone. Maybe not even alone just…time without anything to do.

 

After a quick quinjet trip to a helicarrier hovering above New York City, we transferred to a more low-key private jet belonging to Tony, who is apparently loaning it to us along with his beachfront home in Beverly Hills. The jet is…nice, expensive-looking, and frankly, I don’t think any of us is in a position to admire it.

 

Flash and Bobby are collapsed onto a couch, not really sleeping but zoning as they watch news coverage of New York on a screen hanging from the wall. May and Marion are chatting at a small table over cups of tea, May glancing up at me with a small smile as I walk by. Cindy and Julie, along with Harry and Jubilee, are in the small kitchen, finally making that omelet that was interrupted last time.

 

Wandering among them, I make my way down a small hallway, looking out the window at the night sky, the moonlit clouds looking like a sea of wisps below us. At the end of the hall, I open a small door and step into the bedroom, spotting Riley already sprawled out on her stomach. She rolls onto her back and smiles up at me.

 

“Thought you might be here to join me soon enough.”

 

“You know me so well,” I reply, and she rolls her eyes, sighing and staring up at the ceiling, silent for a long moment.

 

“All five of them, huh?” she asks after a protracted silence. “Gwen’s idea, then. No way it would be ours.”

 

“We should’ve included you right from the beginning – “

 

“No, don’t give me that,” Riley says, shaking her head. “I’m sort of glad I was…not excluded, but just…left alone. I mean, from that. You guys…you did the best you could have. You’re still doing the best you can. You let me be Riley Benson and not…you plus girl-you.”

 

“But now….”

 

“I miss her,” Riley says, sitting up and staring down at her legs, the toes of one foot curling over the other. “Knowing you guys made…something like that work, I…well, you know.”

 

“You feel like shit,” I say with a shrug, moving over to sit next to her on the bed. “Not the first time you’ve been in love with two girls at once.”

 

“There’s like…too many to deal with anymore,” Riley says. “Why do they have to be so….”

 

“Fucking adorable?” I supply, and she sighs.

 

“It’s ridiculous!” she says. “It’s not fair!”

 

“What’s not fair is that you’re so irresistible to so many girls,” Gwen’s voice says, and she steps into the room. “But…let’s not worry about all that, okay? We’ve had way too much world-saving drama, let’s not deal with relationship drama right now.”

 

Behind her, Mary Jane, Jess, Kitty, and Lana file in, followed by Julie.

 

“Julie,” Riley says, biting her lip and peering over at her girlfriend. “I – “

 

“Nope,” Julie says flatly, flouncing over and joining the rest of the girls in some kind of dogpile on the bed. “We’re okay, alright? This is okay, this is perfect.”

 

I sigh, feeling my eyelids really starting to droop, and flop down onto the nearest body, feeling someone snuggle up against me.

 

“Gwen’s right,” I say. “No relationship drama. Only sleep.”

 

“I knew you were smart,” Gwen says with a giggle, and the rest of the girls all shift around, causing the mattress to dip and bounce in places. Luckily, the bed is huge, Tony Stark believing in every luxury, and soon, we’re all settled in, Gwen’s breath puffing softly against my neck while Jess pillows my head on her stomach, allowing me to listen to the rhythmic sound of her breathing.

 

I don’t know who does it, but someone snags the remote for the sound system along the wall, and soon, quiet music filters through the air, the lights dimming and allowing us to watch the stars outside.

 

“ _Take off your shoes, take off yourself._

_“Take off your rented mental health_

_“Take off your raincoat, settle down._

_“Take off your nightmare and your frown_.”

 

It only lasted a couple of days, the craziness that engulfed New York, but it’ll take months to clean up. In the meantime, Tony insists that we take full advantage of his hospitality and make ourselves at home in his Beverly Hills mansion. He (along with literally everyone else I know) also insisted that we consider this a vacation and hang up Neighborhood Watch duty for the remainder of the summer. Frankly, I don’t have it in me to argue. It’s been an exhausting…well, year, really. I don’t think I’ve had much in the way of time off since getting bitten by those spiders so long ago.

 

“ _I’m nobody._

_“Without you, buddy._

_“My long-lost friend_.”

 

We could all use a break.

 


	20. Chapter 20

The small study looked more like a miniature library, with shelves along three of the four walls, the fourth devoted entirely to a floor-to-ceiling window overlooking a snowy mountain range. In the middle of the room sat an ornate metal fireplace, the chimney stretching up through the high ceiling, and next to the fireplace was a fine-looking armchair with red upholstery. This armchair was the destination of the man that opened the door leading to the room, his passage offering a small glimpse of the palatial lodge beyond before he headed toward a rack near the entrance and took up a robe, swinging it around him and tying it as the door shut with a click behind him. It was almost strange for him to wrap the robe over the black bodysuit he was already wearing, a white design on the chest and two white circles around the eyes the only break from the otherwise featureless dark fabric clinging to every muscle and contour of his body. Tying the red robe, patterned with white spiderwebs, around his waist, he made for the chair and settled in, sighing as he relaxed back into the soft padding.

 

“Oh,” he said, “that was quite an introduction. Such attention to detail. You know what? Go back and just…read it again, but I want you to imagine maybe Sir Anthony Hopkins reading it, or maybe even Morgan Freeman. Actually, Morgan Freeman. If I could have a narrator, it would be him.”

 

He paused for a moment, letting the silky words of the narrator’s voice transcribe his every movement, each small shift in his seat as he poured himself a glass of wine. Where did he get the wine? Well, he had it the entire time, of course. The narrator just failed to mention it.

 

“Isn’t this neat?” he said, his voice quivering with excitement. “Oh, quivering. See, I wouldn’t have thought of that! I finally have my very own narrator! Now, I bet you’re wondering to yourself, ‘Dave, where _did_ I leave my wallet?’ Well, I don’t know, Dave. You have to find that out for yourself. But for the rest of you wondering why I’m here instead of one of the writer’s quaint little author’s notes, this is an interlude!”

 

He took a sip of his wine glass, a difficult feat with a mask covering his mouth, but he managed.

 

“Now, on to the interlude,” he said. “So, this is meant to be sort of a cool-off period, because there was just a lot of crazy going on in the past couple of arcs. I mean, we lost Aunt May, Peter and Riley went full psychotic symbiote, there was a bit of _time travel_ , and then there was the whole House of Cards event, which was just…whoa, wow. So, before we move on to fun Summer antics, we’re gonna take some time to…reflect. And the author wants to include you, dear readers.”

 

Edpool shifted in his seat, pouring another glass of wine.

 

“So,” he said, taking another sip. “Mm, that’s good wine. So, if you have any questions about details of the story, the characters, even anything ‘behind-the-scenes’, do send them in the form of a review. I might answer them, or they might be interesting enough to write as a scene! Isn’t that exciting!?”

 

He set his wineglass down, wiping his masked mouth with a robed sleeve.

 

“In the meantime, here are a few little tidbits to keep you busy and provide a little example of the kinds of requests we’re looking for,” he said. “For instance, my canon counterpart, Wade Wilson. Has anyone ever wondered how his day-to-day life as Captain America is different from Steve Rogers’s? Well, let’s answer that right now!”

 

……

_June 17, 2017_

 

Some things never changed. Sure, the world was in many ways a very different place, but at its core, it was still the product of mankind, and mankind had a lot of habits that were hard to break. The average citizen just wanted to continue along his merry way, some of those that weren’t so average found themselves in a position to keep things spinning along, and a select few got ideas on how to run things better.

 

The lattermost types were the ones Wade found himself tangling with more often than not.

 

“This is a mess,” Becky said, her rifle kept at the ready as she surveyed the streets around them. New York City looked…well, a little worse for wear. The buildings towering around them were showing obvious signs of damage from Kaine’s exploding robots. While most were simply pockmarked with craters, a few were completely toppled, reduced to piles of rubble that littered the streets, necessitating Wade’s team to climb over the wreckage as they navigated the fallout zone.

 

“Rogers, report,” Wade said into his communicator.

 

“ _Nothing, Cap_ ,” Sharon said in his ear. “ _Just…weird. Even on a quiet day, it was never_ this _quiet_.”

 

“Save it for your Tumblr page,” Wade heard Becky say nearby, her voice echoing with a strange stereo effect in his ear and also within normal earshot.

 

“ _Fuck you, too, Bex_ ,” Sharon said, and Becky snorted.

 

“Focus up,” Wade said with a small smirk. “Wilson?”

 

“ _I think we’re all clear, Cap_ ,” Sam Wilson said. When Wade had first met his most recent teammate, he’d almost been tempted to do a genealogy check, but not only had Wade had no brothers or sisters to speak of, he’d certainly never left behind any illegitimate children.

 

That he’d known of.

 

Not to mention, Sam had roots in Harlem, and Wade was from Canada, so there were a lot of conflicting backstories there. No matter what the case, though, Sam knew his way around a wingsuit, and Wade just liked the guy.

 

Sometimes, that was all the reason a person needed.

 

“Alright, let’s move onto the next quadrant,” Wade said. “Sam, do a quick circle, note anything that looks like it needs looked into. Sharon, we’re regrouping at the next launch point.”

 

“ _But I can cover more ground_ – “

 

“Sharon,” Wade said firmly. “This isn’t a contest, it’s reconnaissance.”

 

“ _Alright_ ,” Sharon grumbled. “ _En route_.”

 

Wade sighed and took point, Becky close behind. Above, he heard the distant rush of Sam’s wingsuit as he swooped overhead. Ever since Sharon had awoken from her coma with superhuman strength and reflexes, she had gotten a bit cocky. She could hold her own against even Wade now, and the taste of power coupled with her young age was making it difficult to keep her grounded.

 

“ _Got a heat signature_ ,” Sam’s voice spoke into his ear as they made their way down the street. “ _Bakery about two blocks west, ground floor_.”

 

“Nida’s Bakery,” Becky said from behind him. “Sharon and I used to go with gramps and Uncle Steve all the time for these massive cinnamon rolls they had.”

 

“Heck, _I_ remember Nida’s Bakery,” Wade said. “Only ever made a couple trips to New York with Steve, but he would always drag me there.”

 

“ _I’m right outside_ ,” Sharon said. “ _Do you want me to check it out_?”

 

“Hold position,” Wade said. “Sam, can you send Redwing in?”

 

“ _You got it_ ,” Sam said.

 

Wade could almost see the pouty expression on Sharon’s face as her discontented sigh came over his earpiece.  They met up with her a block away from the bakery, and she quirked an eyebrow at him. Just like her great grandfather, Sharon was towheaded with sky blue eyes, and like Steve Rogers, she had a stubborn streak a mile wide. Thankfully, also like her great granddad, she had a Barnes to keep her in line. Becky, being a few years older and wiser, often reined in her best friend’s boundless enthusiasm with a few calm words. Her dark hair and pale skin made her look like the heroine in the dime-a-dozen dystopian future novels that seemed to flood the bookstores lately, where a bland female lead somehow starts a revolution when no one else could do the same thing.

 

He had made the mistake of calling Becky Katniss once. Only once.

 

“ _Got a visual_ ,” Sam said. “ _Looks like…a woman. Mid-twenties. She’s just kinda sitting there_.”

 

“Armed?” Wade asked. “Visibly agitated?”

 

“ _Unarmed_ ,” Sam said. “ _Not visibly…anything. Looks like she might be in shock_.”

 

“I’ll – “ Sharon began, but Wade held up a hand.

 

“I’ll go in,” he said. “You two cover the street. Sam, keep an eye out up there.”

 

“ _Copy_ ,” Sam said. Sharon looked about to protest, but Becky fixed her with a look, and she just rolled her eyes. Wade made his way across the street, picking over some the wreckage of the buildings that hadn’t fared so well in the explosions. As he entered the bakery, he could remember, clear as day, the couple of outings he’d let Steve drag him to in the days following the procedure that had given him his powers, while the military was still trying to figure out what to do with him. Hell, the two had managed to coax along Steve’s hardcore crush -   


“Peggy?”

 

He blinked, not sure if he was just imagining her as a result of thinking about her, but when he opened his eyes again there she was, sprawled into a seat, wearing the dark blue and black uniform of the Winter Soldier, her metal arm exposed to the world. Her face was stoic, her eyes hard and gazing almost angrily out at the shop. When he mentioned her name, her head snapped up to look at him.

 

“What is this place?” she asked, and Wade couldn’t believe he was hearing her voice again after so long. How many times had they worked together, coordinating missions for the Howling Commandos, strategizing, and generally saving the world? Steve, Buck, Peggy, and Wade, often credited as the four people responsible for the first fall of Hydra.

 

Now, it was just Wade and Peggy; he had received word only weeks ago that Steve and Bucky had passed away in their sleep. The funeral had been a small, quiet affair, the way both of them would have preferred it. Wade had been only one of a dozen or so people to attend.

 

“This is Nida’s bakery,” he said. “Steve and Bucky would come here all the time as kids. They never shut up about it.”

 

At Steve’s name, she seemed to perk up a bit, her eyes darting to his face.

 

“Peggy,” Wade said, reaching up and pulling his cowl away. “My name is Wade. Wade Wilson. Do you remember me?”

 

She stared at him for a long moment.

 

“Who’s Steve?” she asked, sounding unduly frustrated. “I…who is that?”

 

“Steve Rogers,” Wade explained. “He was…he was really special to you. You two were insanely in love. Buck and I were so happy for you.”

 

“Steve…” she said, trailing off. “He was…. He was supposed to take me dancing. But the war…. And then I was captured and….”

 

She suddenly leapt to her feet, and Wade took a wary step back, keeping his eyes on her. He didn’t dare reach for a weapon or his shield, not wanting to startle her any more than she already was. She stalked forward and bore down on him, her eyes swimming with tears.

 

“Steve,” she said, the word sounding less like a name and more like a demand. “Where is he? Where is he!?”

 

“Peg…I…don’t know how to tell you,” he said. “Steve…died. Just a few weeks ago.”

 

That, more than anything, seemed to clear whatever snarl of thoughts was tangling up her mind. Hydra had done something to her head, left her lost in her own brain, but Steve’s name was like a beacon, a lifeline thrown for her to grip onto and be pulled to the surface.

 

That made it all the more heartbreaking when she sank to her knees.

 

“No,” she gasped out, sobbing. “No, Steve…. No, he can’t…. He just can’t….”

 

Wade made his way forward and crouched next to her, reaching out to gently grip her shoulder. She just sobbed, her metal fingers clacking against her palm as she clenched a fist.

 

“Wade,” she gasped out. “Wade?”

 

“It’s me, Peg,” Wade said, crouching. “You remember me?”  


“Who did this?” Peggy asked, her voice choked. “Who did this to us?”

 

“I…I guess it was Hydra,” Wade said. Hydra had necessitated his creation, had brought them all together in otherwise unthinkable circumstances, and just as quickly yanked them apart. Wade still looked back at his time with the Howling Commandos, fighting off Hydra and winning the war, as both the best and worst times of his life. Sure, it had been one of the most tumultuous times in American history, but it had also been an exhilarating ride, one that had found him trekking across all of Europe and fighting some truly glorious battles in the name of his adopted homeland. The war had been horrible, and he would never ask to relive it, but he could never truly regret his role, his time spent fighting for the good of the American people.

 

But seeing Peggy breaking down, thinking of the life she had lost…Wade wouldn’t wish his fate on anyone else. He had had only a life already destined to end short and fast, to fizzle out before it had ever begun. To see Peggy, who had had every possibility laid out before her, looking back to see that every single potential path had been scrubbed out, bulldozed before her very eyes…it was heartbreaking.

 

“Are they…gone?” she asked, sniffling. “Hydra. Are they finally finished?”

 

“Not entirely,” Wade said, “but we’re definitely working on it.”

 

She stood, and Wade was reminded of why Peggy Carter remained to this day such a terrifying example of why a woman could be just as intimidating as a man.

 

“I want to help,” she said. “I want to make it ‘entirely’.  Please…let me help.”

 

In that moment, all Wade could think about was a second-generation Howling Commandos, led by Captain America and his faithful right-hand lady, Peggy Carter. Fighting Hydra at every turn, even in modern times.

 

Heck…that didn’t sound half bad at all.

 

……

 

“Aw, isn’t that just sweet?” Edpool said, now with a small dog across his lap. The dog looked like a common miniature dachshund, though with the trademark Deadpool suit in a stylish black and white coloration. “Oh, this little fella? This is Dachspool. And for those of you confused by the spelling, it’s pronounced Dash Pool. He’ll be making an appearance later, probably, but this is early bird cameo. Isn’t he just adorable?”

 

The dachshund rolled onto his back, and Edpool took a moment to scratch his tummy.

 

“He’s just a little cutie, isn’t he?” Edpool cooed. “Sorry for the gratuitous sweetness, but the author had a mini dachshund that died a couple years back, and that dog was precious to him. And since I’m the author mouthpiece, I’m obligated to tell those of you reading this that have any sort of pets to just go hug them now. I’ll wait.”

 

Edpool sat back in his seat, giving the readers ample time to go hug their pets while he scratched Dachspool’s tummy. The small, smartly-dressed pup writhed happily in his lap at the attention, tongue lolling out through his mask.

 

“So, now that we’ve taken a moment to appreciate our domesticated animals, how about that little tidbit, huh?” he asked. “There is a lot of behind-the-scenes stuff at work, here. When our creative team comes up with the plot, they also keep in mind as much of the rest of the Marvel universe as they can. So, Cap, Iron Man, Norman Osborn, even someone as obscure as Meteor Man, it’s all taken into mind. Also, our creative team is just a guy and a couple of his friends, so…you know, go easy on the fella.”

 

In Edpool’s lap, Dachspool shifted and settled onto his stubby little legs, hopping down and trotting toward the door of the study.

 

“Well, it looks like Dachspool need to go potty, so I’m gonna let him outside to do his business,” Edpool said. “In the meantime, in the interest of more coverage of off-screen characters, here’s a little peek into another character whose origin story was turned slightly inside out.”

 

……

 

_March 15, 2016_

 

In general, when Tony had a lot going on in his life, he could always count on his cars. Having as much money as he did, he eschewed simpler hobbies like collecting models of vehicles and simply kept a garage full of the real deals. It felt nice, collecting old junkers that anyone else would dismiss as beyond repair and…repairing them. To fix something so very broken that everyone else had given up on it, there was a sort of poetry there.

 

Plus, he like to show off, and fixing the unfixable was a way he could do it every day.

 

Today’s patient was an aging ’56 Oldsmobile Super 88 convertible.  Not uncommon by collector standards, but fun enough to take out for a day at the beach with your uptight redheaded secretary that just needed to let her hair down once in a while. Of course, it had to be fixed up first and given an appropriate paint job. For a classic beauty such as this, fire-engine red seemed a fine choice, with some off-white accents and painted hubcaps?

 

Oh, she would clean up quite nicely.

 

“Jarvis, give me Classics Collection Number Seven,” he said as he raised the old junker on a lift and stepped under, looking up into the rusted engine cavity. The whole motor would have to be rebuilt from scratch or, ideally, obtained from a reputable seller. “And see if you can find me an engine for this thing.”

 

“ _At once, sir_ ,” Jarvis said, and Guns and Roses filled the air as Tony began poking around the underside of the vehicle. He could make himself feel busy, grab a handful of tools and do some preliminary adjustments, but he preferred to understand the project as a whole before digging around.

 

“ _Sir, Miss Potts is on her way down_ ,” Jarvis said.

 

“Speaking of projects,” he muttered to himself.

 

“Why are you not in New York City right now?” Pepper Potts said, striding into Tony’s workshop like she owned the place. She passed between two tables full of various car parts and over to the line of lifts that he sometimes had completely filled with works in progress.

 

He did love works in progress.

 

“Aren’t you supposed to be on vacation?” Tony asked her.

 

“I’m not _supposed_ to be on vacation, you _suggested_ I go on vacation, but this company almost collapsed after I took an extended _lunch_ – “

 

“That was a fluke, and I told you it would never happen again, let’s not exaggerate – “

 

“How many promises have you made that you just don’t remember anymore?”

 

“All of them?” Tony suggested. “You know how I feel about promises.”

 

“’Promises are just postponing disappointment’,” Pepper said wryly. “Quest Aerospace just sent me a _very_ sternly-worded e-mail – “

 

“Then send one back to them,” Tony said, stepping out from under the Oldsmobile. “Throw me under the bus. I was uncooperative, pigheaded, stubborn – “

 

“Implying that that is anything but true?”

 

“Ouch,” Tony said, placing a hand over his heart. “Are you really so discontented with your boss?”

 

“Considering said boss hasn’t given me a raise in two years?” Pepper asked with a quirk of her eyebrow.

 

“Fall bonus,” Tony announced. “Considering all of the sacrifices my personal secretary has made, I feel she at least deserves a substantial bonus – “

 

“And a raise?” Pepper asked with a smirk.

 

“A notable raise,” Tony said. “Let it never be said that I don’t care about my subordinates.”

 

“Wow, if I’d known it was this easy to get a few extra bucks out of you, I would—ah!”

 

She broke off, and they both jumped as an orange light appeared in the shop, sizzling softly before growing into some sort of portal. Tony stepped in front of Pepper as a man emerged. Behind him, the otherworldly doorway showed some sort of fancy study beyond it before shrinking back into the nothingness.

 

The man that emerged was…well, more than a little strange. He wore some kind of blue and purple getup straight out of a Tibetan monastery, topped with a flowing red cape that seemed to billow behind him despite the lack of a breeze. His face was…oddly exotic. He had narrow eyes and high cheekbones set into a strangely flat face that was just…odd. His dark hair was combed back, and he had a mustache-goatee combo similar to Tony’s.

 

Tony reached behind him and grabbed up the nearest heavy object, a tire iron which he wielded in front of him.

 

“Jarvis, intruder protocol,” he said, glaring at the cloaked man. “You have two seconds to go back the way you came.”

 

“Please, I mean you no harm,” the man said. Tony wasn’t listening, however. He lunged forward and swung, but the tire iron seemed to smack into an invisible barrier, rebounding off of with a muted _whump_ sound. “Well, that was just uncalled for. Can we just talk like civilized men?”

 

“Who are you?” Pepper asked from behind Tony. The man eyed her for a moment, folding his arms over his chest before looking back to Tony.

 

“My name is Dr. Stephen Strange,” he said. “I’ve come with a warning.”

 

“Stephen Strange,” Tony said. The name was certainly familiar, and this guy looked like Stephen Strange. He had been one of the most brilliant surgeons in the world, not too different from Tony Stark in their respective careers. But that didn’t make sense. Why was he stepping through some kind of wormhole into Tony’s office dressed up like some Liberace wannabe?

 

“ _Doctor_ Stephen Strange,” the doctor corrected him with a wry smile. “I don’t use the PhD so often anymore, but earning it was no easy feat.”

 

“What happened to you?” Tony asked. “Last I heard, you dropped off the face of the earth after some…accident.”

 

“It’s a whole thing I’ll be glad to tell you about later,” Dr. Strange said with an airy wave of his hand. “Right now, though, I’m here with a warning, as I said. I’ve heard mutterings, in certain circles I’m a part of. Do you know of a man who calls himself the Mandarin?”

 

“Never heard of him,” Tony said, shaking his head.

 

“I figured so,” Dr. Strange nodded. “He’s much more invested in my side of things than yours. All you need to know is that he’s after something, and for whatever reason, you’re in his way to getting it.”

 

“Getting what?” Tony asked. “What sort of magical McGuffin am I worth?”

 

“If I told you it was a magical artifact as old as the universe itself and capable of warping the very fabric of reality, would you believe me?” Dr. Strange asked with a quirk of the eyebrow.

 

“Did you join a cult during your little sabbatical?” Tony asked, earning a slightly exasperated sigh from the doctor.

 

“Everyone always asks that,” he mutters. “Listen, the long and short of it is, this weapons demonstration you’re going to next week? That’s when it’s all happening. You can make preparations, beef up security, or just don’t go. I just felt it was in everyone’s best interests to let you know. The last thing we need is the Mandarin getting his hands on this thing, and I’m sure you’d rather not be used as a bargaining chip.”

 

“And what if I choose not to believe you?” Tony asked.

 

“Then you’ll probably have a rough couple of weeks ahead,” Dr. Strange said with a shrug. “I’ve come to deliver my warning, and I have. Do with it what you will. As it is, I have a Collector to track down.”

 

With that, he held his hands out, circling one around the other. Before him, another of those sizzling orange-yellow circles grew, expanding to reveal the same study as before. He bade them one last small nod before stepping through. Tony made to follow, but Pepper grabbed his arm.

 

“No,” she said firmly as the portal closed.

 

“Well…I guess I owe Obie a thousand dollars,” Tony grumbled.

 

“Why’s that?” Pepper asked, sounding bemused.

 

“I bet him I’d be the first one to invent a Portal gun.”

 

……

 

_June 19, 2017_

 

“Tadashi, would you get the door?” Aunt Cass’s voice called seconds after the doorbell in the small apartment rang. Tadashi had tried to insist that he could provide a nicer place for his only parental figure and his little brother, but Aunt Cass didn’t want to leave behind her business, and frankly, it was already a pretty nice place.

 

Aunt Cass had done pretty well by him and Hiro.

 

“I got it, Aunt Cass!” a high voice shouted, and Tadashi smiled to himself as he lowered back into his chair, having not even gotten completely to his feet. Hiro was home for the summer, and now that Tadashi was unexpectedly bunking with them after the mayhem in New York, he was in high spirits indeed. Hiro would never admit it, but Tadashi knew that the little guy missed him.

 

Maybe he could talk Tony or Mr. Osborn into letting him spend a few weeks at Oscorp once they got the place fixed up.

 

He leaned back in his seat, clicking around on his computer. The Baymax armor had performed admirably in its little shakedown, and if Fred was to be believed, Big Hero 6 was going to be the next big superhero team. Also according to Fred, this meant that a Mk. II was necessary, though he didn’t think he would go with Fred’s suggestion of humongous crab legs and pincers.

 

It sounded cool on paper, but it would be a nightmare to actually design.

 

“Crab legs?” an amused voice danced into his ears, and Tadashi felt hands on his shoulders, gently squeezing them. “I thought Fred was all about dragons and stuff?”

 

“He likes monsters in general,” Tadashi said with a shrug, smiling and spinning in his chair. There stood Jean Grey, looking as amazing as ever. She smiled down at him, a smile of such absolute warmth that Tadashi couldn’t believe he’d managed to get such an angel interested in him.

 

“Stop thaaaat,” she giggled, shaking her head. “Your mushy thoughts are always so embarrassing.”

 

“How are they embarrassing?” Tadashi asked as she settled down onto his lap like it was the most normal thing in the world, dropping a little kiss onto his lips.

 

“Because I don’t deserve half of them,” she said.

 

“No, you don’t,” Tadashi said. “You deserve every single one.”

 

Jean rolled her eyes, leaning in for another kiss and simply slumping against him.

 

“Mmmm,” she hummed contentedly, nuzzling into his neck. “Tell your brother to stop peeping on us.”

 

“Hiro Hamada,” Tadashi said warningly, and he heard a dissatisfied huff before his door clicked quietly shut. “Sorry. One look, and he was probably in love.”

 

“Pretty much,” Jean said with a small snort, still pressing against him. “Hug me?”

 

Tadashi didn’t hesitate to wrap his arms around her and give her a squeeze, though he was concerned a bit; Jean wasn’t usually the touchy-feely type. Sure, she was affectionate, but she was, in her own words, “Not much of a hugger.”

 

“What’s – “

 

“Wait,” Jean said in a whisper, cutting him off and pressing her forehead to his. She shut her eyes, and Tadashi saw a contented smile on her face. “Hm…that’s better.”

 

“Jean, what is going on?” Tadashi asked. “Your sort-of-boyfriend is getting a bit worried here.”

 

“I…so, you know how the Terrigen stuff kinda amped up my powers?” she asked, and Tadashi nodded. After the fact, Hank McCoy had shared some speculations that due to the close relation between mutant powers and inhuman abilities, the Terrigen mist would probably have at least a temporary effect on mutants as well. Jean had certainly gotten a bit of a psychic boost, though she later told Tadashi that it had felt less like her power was growing and more like it had been breaking free of a shackle or a cage, like she had only known her full potential after that moment.

 

“I know who caged it,” Jean said, sounding shaken now, and Tadashi hugged her again.

 

“Who?” he asked.

 

“Professor X,” Jean said. “He…the day he found me and took me in, he put a…a mental block on me. He thought I was…too powerful or just not ready for it. And I’m like, how could I ever be ready if I didn’t even know there was more to this power I have? He never told me, and I don’t think he ever _planned_ to tell me. I could…I could see it in the back of his head. He was afraid of me.”

 

“Afraid?”

 

“Professor X has been the most powerful psychic in the world for decades,” she said. “Suddenly this little girl shows up that could kick his psychic butt. I…I think he might have been jealous or something.”

 

“I never would have figured him for the jealous type,” Tadashi said.

 

“That’s not all, though,” Jean said, squeezing tightly to Tadashi. “He’s…in love with me.”

 

Tadashi blinked a few times, not quite comprehending what she was saying.

 

“Wanna run that by me again?” he asked, and Jean sighed.

 

“He…I think I reminded him of some woman he used to love back in the day, and…I mean….ugh, I try not to think about it, really,” she said. “Some of the stuff he thought was just….”

 

“Well, you’re welcome to hang out here for now,” Tadashi said. “Really, all I have to do is tell Aunt Cass you’re my girlfriend, and she’ll never let you leave.”

 

Jean giggled at that, smiling a sweet smile at him and kissing his nose. “Okay, but…I’m seriously gonna have to run a lot of damage control, too,” she said. “I mean…he’s getting all…weird about me, what’s to stop him from getting all creepy on the other girls? Not to mention, he messed with my brain without telling me. Why wouldn’t he do that to others? The fact is, Professor X is…dangerous….”

 

“Don’t worry,” Tadashi said, nodding firmly. “You make some calls, and I’ll make mine. I’ve got connections. I know some of your X-pals don’t have anywhere to go, so…maybe I can get them somewhere to go.”

 

“You’d do that?” Jean asked with one of those smiles that just made him fall in love with her all over again, and she playfully pouted at him, no doubt reading his affection. “Tadashiiii.”

 

She smooched his cheek, and Tadashi just snorted, hugging her tightly.

 

“I gotta look out for my girl’s friends, right?” he asked. “Don’t worry, there’ll always be a place for the mutants of the world to call home.”

 

……

 

“Oh, scandalous,” Edpool said, still with Dachspool in his lap. The small suited dog seemed to have fallen asleep at some point, snorting out tiny little snoring sounds. “So, that was a bit to take in, but hopefully, the timestamps helped. In any case, I sure hope that helps show how much our dear writer has going on in the background. Not much of this is being written off the cuff, and there’s always a master plan in the works.”

 

Dachspool rolled over in his lap with a little grunting sound, and Edpool chuckled, scratching him behind the ears.

 

“So, that was round one of the missing moments, and as I said before, if any of you have questions, send them in a review!” he said excitedly. “I know like…two people still read this story, so _one_ of you has to have a question, right? Right!?”

 

He shook his head, leaning back in his seat and taking another long drink. Outside, the pristine winter backdrop was experiencing a bit of light snowfall, giving stark contrast to the warm interior of the lodge Edpool called home.

 

“Well…of the couple-hundreds of you that peek in with each new chapter, if at least…a tenth of you bothered to review…well, gosh, it would just tickle our dear writer pink,” he said. “The pace would certainly pick up, at least. For now, though, I have to put this little fella to bed.”

 

With that, Edpool stood, scooping up the snoozing dachshund in his arms and carrying him out of the room and down the hallway, out of sight. He could be heard cooing to the canine the whole way to the bedroom, until the distant sounds of a door opening and shutting cut off even those faint sounds.


	21. Chapter 21

_April 19, 2017_

 

Once upon a time, Cindy Moon had had a crush on Peter Parker.

 

Okay, maybe she still did, but she was able to mostly ignore it at this point. Kind of.

 

In any case, in a strange effort to try to feel closer to him, she had binge-watched his YouTube videos one summer evening, and she had learned two things. First, Peter Parker was in fact a complete dork, with a quietly reserved demeanor that he broke through once in a while to show a rather witty sense of humor.

 

Second, she hated horror games.

 

Harry Osborn and Peter Parker had loved playing horror games.

 

Why was this pertinent now? Well, because Cindy Moon was currently sifting her way through the wreckage of an old hospital, one that had been devastated in an attack from some Godzilla-wannabe called Stegron. Her Journalism class was currently working on some current events assignment, Mr. Kepler having simply told them to “go find a story” or something.

 

Well, ground zero for a mutated dinosaur monster attack was a good place to look for a story, right?

 

The problem was, a broken down and condemned hospital was evoking a lot of the same feelings those YouTube videos of horror games set in hospitals tended to. The atmosphere was much the same, tiled floors and plain walls now water-stained and covered in dirt and rubble, barely lit by the afternoon sun filtering in through the broken windows. It was a bleak, depressing place, once so active and full of people and now empty, having seen some true horrors.

 

To top it off, Cindy had never been a fan of hospitals in the first place.

 

Holding her flashlight aloft, she crept down a back hallway. There were no windows except for one at the very end, so light was scarce. Thankfully, there was little in the way of rubble, so there wasn’t much to trip over. Still, despite her insistence to herself that she had conquered her fear of the dark at a young age, she suddenly realized that it wasn’t the dark that elicited such a terrified reaction from her.

 

The dark was fine when she knew what it was hiding. Here, she had no idea. Cindy was afraid of the unknown.

 

The further along the hallway she went, the more she felt completely on edge. It was all the anxiety of watching one of those videos or even playing one of the games, but the fear, the terror for one’s own life was very real and palpable in this case. If there was a jumpscare, there was no screen or controller between her and what was happening.

 

There was only her.

 

And she would insist, until her dying day, that that was why she jumped a few feet in the air and let out what could only be a shriek when the beam from her flashlight glided right over a face wearing a bemused expression.

 

“Oh, fucking…fuck!” she squeaked out, stumbling backward. “Get back!”

 

“Hey, hey, it’s okay!” a voice said from the darkness, and Cindy relaxed only slightly when she heard how obviously young the speaker was. Her flashlight slowly made its way back to the face, and she saw a dark-skinned boy squinting into the light. “Uh…you mind? Going a little blind here.”

 

“Um…sorry,” she said, shining the light upward but leaving enough ambient light that the boy was illuminated, along with a friend, it seemed. A short, squat Asian kid about the same apparent age as the dark-skinned lurker stood nearby, and judging by the look of adoration he was giving Cindy, it was one of those middle-school “love at first sight” deals.

 

Ew. She did _not_ need to deal with an admirer on top of all of this.

 

“Um…we’re kinda here on a dare thing from a friend,” the dark-skinned boy said. “We’re all supposed to be off on our own, but I mean…we don’t wanna get killed by a clown or something so Ganke and I stuck together. Could we hang out with you?”

 

“Um…sure,” Cindy shrugged, pleased with how normal this all sounded. “I’m just after some kind of story for my school. Journalism class.”

 

“Oh, what if like this place was some kind of super-secret lab that was running experiments and stuff?” the squat boy said. “And they made Stegron and he was pissed off, so he tore it down?”

 

“With all the bullshit that’s been happening, I really wouldn’t doubt that,” the other boy said, looking up at Cindy with a wide-eyed blink. “Oh, right. I’m Miles. That’s Ganke.”

 

“Cindy,” she introduced herself. “You’re here with friends?”

 

“Yeah, but we all went off in – “

 

“Miles!?” a female voice called, and Miles tensed up, glancing around.

 

“That way,” Cindy said, shining her flashlight down the hall. They all took off, Miles in the lead, Cindy close behind with her flashlight illuminating their path.

 

“Julie!?” Miles called, and they heard another plaintive little shout.

 

“Miles!”

 

They rounded another corner, and a small redheaded girl flew into Miles’s arms, squeezing him.

 

“Hey, we’re right here,” Miles said, rubbing her back. “What happened?”

 

“Something…something bit me,” Julie said. “Like a bug or something.”

 

“Probably a mosquito or something,” Miles said with a shrug, and Julie huffed in his arms.

 

“You know I hate bugs,” she said, pouting up at him.

 

“Oh, uh…sorry,” Miles said sheepishly. Behind him, Ganke jumped and jerked away from the wall, almost running into Cindy. “Ganke?”

 

“Something got me, too,” he said, looking at his arm. “Ew, look at that, like a spider bite.”

 

“Okay, I was okay with a creepy abandoned hospital, but if this place is like infested with bugs, I’m out,” Julie said, powering past the two and pausing at the sight of Cindy. “Um…hi.”

 

“Hey,” Cindy said. “I’m Cindy.”

 

“I’m Julie,” she said, “and, like…this sounds rude, but I’m leaving, because this place is just…bugs.”

 

“I understand,” Cindy said, glancing around the place. “I think I’m gonna get out of here, too.”

 

She was about to follow Julie when she felt a sharp pain in her ankle, followed by a chill-inducing crawly sensation up her calf.

 

“Fuck!” she screeched, shaking her leg. “Oh, ew, ew, fucking fuck bugs.”

 

“Yeah, one totally just got me, too,” Miles said, rubbing tenderly at his elbow. “Let’s just get out of here.”

 

“Seriously, guys, this is how horror movies start, though,” Ganke said as they made their way back along the hallway toward the exit. “Next thing you know, we’ll be like sprouting a buncha legs and growing these buggy eyes like that guy that was on the news – “

 

“Ganke, this is actually the least helpful thing you could be saying,” Miles told him. “Like, you could have said this place is scary, and that would be bad but not awful, but you are actually saying the worst thing possible.”

 

“Where’s Alex?” Julie asked, and Cindy was a bit worried at how limp her voice sounded. “Alex!?”

 

“Okay, looking back, it might have been a bad idea to come here,” a boy who must have been Alex said as he met them in the entry way to the hospital. “I just got – “

 

“Bitten by a bug?” Julie asked. “Literally all of us just did, too.”

 

“Is everyone okay?” Alex asked, his eyes tracking over all of them before landing on Cindy. “Who are you?”

 

“Cindy,” she introduced herself. “Look, let’s get out of here, and we can…regroup or something.”

 

……

 

“Are you serious? You have them, too?”

 

Miles hung upside-down from his ceiling, feet clinging like magnets. One hand kept him glued down, the other holding his phone to his ear.

 

“ _Yeah, Alex, too_ ,” Julie said. “ _Miles, what’s going on_?”

 

“Well, we got bit by those things, and now we have like…powers, like the Spider-Trio,” Miles said. “This is completely – “

 

_Knock-knock-knock-knock-knock!_

 

Miles jumped as a frantic tapping sound came from his window. He hurried over and pulled his curtains aside to see….

 

“Ganke?” he breathed. “Dude, what the fuck?”

 

“ _What’s happening_?” Julie said into the phone as Miles yanked his window open.

 

“Ganke’s here, but….”

 

“Bro, I just passed out in my room, and when I woke up, I was like…half my size!” Ganke said urgently, crawling through Miles’s window and standing there in a shirt that was much too big for him. Ganke…if he wasn’t talking just like Miles’s best friend, Miles would barely recognize him. He was skin and bone, with a wiry build of muscle that made him look like some kind of Chinese Kung-Fu film star. He wore the most confused expression Miles had ever seen on another person, a mixture of shock and utter joy.

 

“ _But what_?” Julie asked, rousing Miles out of his contemplation of his newly-scrawny best friend.

 

“We need to all meet up,” Miles said. “Tomorrow. We need to, like…process this together.”

 

……

 

Julie supposed that it should have been suspicious from the get-go, five teens meeting on some rooftop in the middle of Harlem, but really, the fact that they had a visitor before even testing out their powers was just a bit insulting.

 

The fact that that visitor was the Scarlet Spider was…a bit awe-inspiring.

 

She was a bit shorter than Julie had imagined she would be, but still taller than Julie herself, almost matching Cindy for height. She swung to an easy landing on the rooftop, crawling to her feet to stride over to them. A voluminous brown ponytail stuck out from her mask, but the most prominent feature was the pair of twin glowing pink eyes that peered across the five of them. Next to her in her polished and professional-grade costume, Julie felt a bit silly wearing the old wetsuit she had bought last summer during a vacation to California. It had been good for surfing, and the body coverage and tight fit made it a good choice for their first foray into using their spider-powers, but now she just felt like a little kid playing superhero.

 

“ _Who are you_?” the girl asked, and Julie was ashamed at the way she jumped; that modulated voice was a bit off-putting. “ _Did I walk in on a pre-heist psych-up_?”

 

“Are those actually a thing?” Ganke asked, and Julie sighed.

 

“Ganke, seriously, shut up,” she said.

 

“ _You’d be surprised how often we stop a heist before it starts because the guys needed a moment to go full Eminem_ ,” the Scarlet Spider said.

 

“’Mom’s spaghetti’?” Julie supplied, smiling behind her mask, and the superhero nodded with obvious satisfaction.

 

“ _Exactly_ ,” she chuckled, looking at the five of them in turn. “ _So, this doesn’t look like a heist. What’s going on here_?”

 

“We…” Miles began, trailing off. “You won’t believe this, but we got bitten by these…bugs or something.”

 

The Scarlet Spider tensed at that, fixing Miles with what was probably a glare behind her goggles. “ _And you went home, passed out, and woke up with spidery powers_?”

 

“Um…yeah, pretty much,” Miles said. The girl sighed, folding her arms over her chest as she studied them thoughtfully for a long moment. Her head tilted curiously to one side.

 

“ _Where did you find these spiders_?” she asked, her tone suggesting she’d only just thought of the question herself.

 

“Um…this old abandoned hospital,” Cindy said. “Where you guys fought Stegron? I was there for some stupid assignment from school. Thanks, Mr. Kepler, I have spider-powers thanks to you.”

 

“ _Kepler_?” Scarlet asked, and she reached for her mask, tugging it away. Her voice changed as the modulator left it, and Julie couldn’t help but marvel at how…cute she sounded without it. “ _You go to_ Midtown High, don’t you? Cindy Moon!”

 

Cindy was frozen with shock, and Julie was similarly stunned, albeit for quite a different reason. As she laid eyes upon this girl, took in the way the city lights glinted golden in her brown hair, she couldn’t help but gasp softly.

 

She was…beautiful.

 

The girl turned piercing blue eyes onto Julie at the sound she made, and Julie blushed behind her mask.

 

This girl was going to be trouble.

 

……

 

“Trouble, indeed,” Edpool said, perched in the same chair as before. A wineglass sat primly on the table next to him, and he was currently smoking a cigar. At his feet, Dachspool slept soundly. “That was just a little peek into the origin story of Miles and Co. Interesting little tidbit; the author originally planned a standalone tale of Miles Morales and his spider antics, but it just never took off the way he planned. One story keeps him pretty busy, but he tends to get it into his head that he can handle more. Silly boy.”

 

He took a long sip from the wineglass next to him, setting it back down with a refreshed smack of his lips.

 

“So! Got a few reviews, that’s great, and one person requested more of Tony,” Edpool said. “Personally, I like the more mellow mentor Tony who didn’t have to go through a bunch of crap in Afghanistan and just thinks Peter is the bee’s knees. Let’s see what he’s up to.”

 

……

 

_June 18, 2017_

 

“Whatever happened to the redhead?” Stephen Strange asked, peering over at Tony as the armored man surveyed the Parker household. “Your assistant?”

 

“ _Pepper_?” Tony asked, his shoulders whirring in a shrug. “ _After I got booted out of my company, I just up and left, didn’t really feel like dealing with anyone. I ghosted. She didn’t wait. By the time I got back in touch, she had a cozy little job at Quest Aerospace. Can’t say I blame her, really. Apparently, I’m hard to work with_.”

 

“No,” Stephen said flatly, his voice oozing sarcasm. “Say it isn’t so.”

 

“ _In any case, she’s engaged and happy, so who am I to try to step in_?” Tony said. “ _Besides, I found someone to settle down with eventually_.”

 

“ _You found someone_ ,” a voice said into Tony’s helmet, and with a rushing sound, Carol landed next to him, looking amazing in her Iron Marvel armor. “ _I don’t know about settling down, though_.”

 

“ _Carol_ ,” Tony said with a pleased smile. “ _You’re looking –_ “

 

“ _What’s that look for_?” Carol asked, a warning tone in her voice.

 

“ _What look_?” Tony asked incredulously. “ _I have a full facemask_ – “

 

“ _I can tell when you have a look_ ,” Carol said. “ _It’s a full body thing you_ – “

 

“ _There is no such look on my face_ ,” Tony insisted. “ _I’m just_ – “

 

“ _Anthony Edward Stark, you are up to something_!” Carol accused him, leveling a metal finger at him. “ _Whatever you’re planning, no!_ ”

 

The ground beneath them rumbled ever so slightly, and a puff of smoke and dust came from one of the lower windows of the Parker home. Stephen slowly meandered away while Tony held up a hand, finger raised to forestall any objections for a moment.

 

“ _Okay, but what if I’m already doing it_?”

 

“ _Tony_!”

 

“ _Carol, it’s just a little welcome home present for the Neighborhood Watch_ ,” Tony said. “ _An afterschool organization like theirs needs a clubhouse, right_?”

 

“ _No, knowing you, they’ll wind up with some kind of underground bunker stocked with every bit of tech you can cram into it_ ,” Carol said as the loud sounds of industrial equipment echoed upward from underground. “ _And an Arby’s_.”

 

“ _I was thinking either that or a Taco Bell_ ,” Tony said. “ _Fully staffed by chameleon bots, of course, for the sake of discretion_.”

 

“ _Tony…_ ” Carol groaned, but Tony could tell from her tone that he was winning her over.

 

“ _Carol, c’mon_ ,” Tony said. “ _The kid’s been through a lot, and I’m just looking to give him a little welcome-back gift, show him some appreciation, you know? Let me dote, huh_?”

 

Carol snorted through her mask, shaking her head with a gentle whir of her suit. “ _You really like Parker, don’t you_?”

 

Tony was quiet for a moment, staring at the house. The actual home itself would be largely untouched, save for an elevator Tony had crammed into the foundation, next to the basement, and even then, it would just be a door on a previously blank stretch of wall. Tony wasn’t the sentimental type, but he knew Pete probably wouldn’t appreciate a full-scale remodel of his family home without at least a phone call.

 

“ _He reminds me of…myself, I suppose_ ,” he said to Carol. “ _Minus the billionaire upbringing and whatnot. He’s a bright kid missing some parental figures in his life, and…. All I had was Obie, and we know how that turned out. I’m not a father figure by any means. I’m not looking to fill that role, and I don’t think Pete’s looking for that with me anyway. But I know what I missed out on, and I know what would’ve made my life easier back then. He’s in for a bumpy ride, but if I can smooth it out even a little, I’m happy to throw some money around_.”

 

Carol was silent for a moment, and Tony had just enough time to dread that he’d started up the waterworks before a solid impact landed on his shoulder, a metallic _clung_ sounding as Carol punched his shoulder.

 

“ _He’s lucky to have you_ ,” was all she said, and Tony snorted.

 

“ _Lot of that going around_.”

 

……

 

“Aw, they love each other!” Edpool said, while Dachspool stirred in his lap, snorting out a small noise as he heard an imaginary sound in the distance.

 

“Borf.”

 

“Oh, there he goes,” Edpool said indulgently.

 

“Borf! Borororororf!”

 

The diminutive doxen hopped from Edpool’s lap, tearing out of the room and down the hall toward the front door of the cabin. Edpool only watched with evident amusement, leaning back in his seat and taking another sip of his wine.

 

“Look at him go,” he chuckled, shaking his head as he set the wineglass down. “So, that was a bit of Tony Stark interaction for the lovely Black Cat, who is always kind enough to leave a review whenever a new chapter is posted. And to answer your question, feel free to shoot a private message with your e-mail.”

 

Dachspool trotted back in and hopped up into his lap, curling up and settling in.

 

“So, we also got requests for more of Big Hero 6, as well as Hiro,” Edpool said. “So…here!”

 

……

 

_June 20, 2017_

 

“ _…weeks since the incident that brought New York City to a grinding halt, and cleanup crews are predicting that it will take months until the Big Apple is livable again. Refugees are beginning to settle in for a long stay away from home, but it’s hard for some of them to feel bitter when many were lucky to escape with their lives._ ”

 

“ _I was just trying to get to an evac point, and this…lizard thing came around a corner and went after me, you know_?” an interviewee said on screen as Tadashi watched. “ _But then, next thing I know, there’s Spider-Man! And a bunch of girls from the Neighborhood Watch, and they’re kicking the crap out of this lizard, and one of the girls helps me to the evac point. She just…hauls me up over her shoulder, carries me up a wall and over a building! It was wild_!”

 

“ _Spider-Man and his Neighborhood Watch weren’t the only ones ensuring the survival of New York citizens, though_ ,” the anchor went on. “ _While the Avengers helped SHIELD evacuate the people, a new group of well-meaning vigilantes helped bring order to utter chaos. The self-styled Big Hero 6_ – “

 

“Represent!” Fred shouted. “Fredzilla!”

 

“Not what I had in mind when I started at MIT, but hey, I’ll take it,” Aiko said, blowing a large pink bubble and letting it pop before she pulled it back in and resumed chewing away at her gum. “Looks like we went and made a name for ourselves.”

 

“And we saved so many people!” Reiko said with a bubbly giggle. “So many lives changed for the better!”

 

“We did pretty good out there,” Tadashi admitted. “Tony’s already talking about making Big Hero 6 like a special ops squad in SHIELD. We only take the missions we want, but we’d be going out and making the world a better place.”

 

“That sounds pretty sick,” Aiko said with a nod. “Like James Bond, but there’s six of us, and we’re American.”

 

“I am so ready to save the world,” Fred said, leaning back into his chair. They quartet were currently lounging in Aunt Cass’s living room while she maintained the coffee shop she ran downstairs. The smells of coffee and pastries were wafting upstairs to them, and Tadashi had already sent Hiro on a scouting mission for some drinks and maybe a few doughnuts that were nearing the end of their shelf life.

 

“You shouldn’t use your little brother like that,” Jean chided him as she made her way in, Madelyne following closely behind. It was remarkable, how human their construct looked. Her skin was a bit too pale, her eyes slightly darker than most normal people’s, but otherwise, she looked like a rather unique human being. Behind her, a slightly less human-looking robot cantered in and scanned the room. Jarvis hadn’t left Madelyne’s side since she was “born”, and Maddie didn’t seem bothered by it, so they mostly just let the pair be.

 

“I’m not _using_ him,” Tadashi insisted, watching as Maddie found a seat near a window, Jarvis taking point next to her chair. “He actually wants to look good for all of you guys. Especially you.”

 

He pulled a giggling Jean into his lap, and his girlfriend settled in, curling her legs up to lean against him.

 

“I thought I was the psychic of the group,” she said.

 

“A big brother always knows what’s going on in his little brother’s head,” Tadashi said with a chuckle. “Just let him have his fun. He’s probably watching the news right now, and he’s put the pieces together. He knows all about Baymax, so I bet any second he’s gonna come in and – “

 

“Tadashi, you’re on the news!” Hiro said, bursting into the room with a tray laden with six disposable cups of coffee and a mountain of freshly-made cinnamon rolls. No doubt, Aunt Cass had had the whole lot prepared fresh, never content to let Tadashi make do with the throwaways. “You made the Baymax armor!”

 

“His idea,” Tadashi muttered, and Jean shook against him with a giggle, reaching out to take a cup of coffee from the tray. “Thanks, Hiro.”

 

“Tadashi, are you a superhero?” Hiro asked, his eyes wide as he stared up at Tadashi.

 

“You know, I guess I am,” Tadashi said with a grin. “Proud of me yet?”  


“Yes!” Hiro said, skipping over to pass out coffee cups to the rest. Madelyne took hers and eyed it curiously while Jarvis watched. “Tadashi, this so makes up for you leaving! You weren’t just going off to be a boring old scientist. You were doing like some super-secret superhero training or something! Did you meet Spider-Man? What’s he like?  Are you part of the Neighborhood Watch? Or are you an Avenger?”

 

“Yes. He’s a good guy. No. And, I guess I am an Avenger?”

 

“ _Mister Stark has already added Big Hero 6 to the Avengers database_ ,” Jarvis said, watching Maddie take a tentative sip of her coffee. “ _He also wanted me to remind you that I am to be considered a loan and that if I am damaged in any permanent capacity, he will be…rather cross with you_.”

 

“Well, you tell Tony that I would never let anything happen to you,” Maddie said with a little huff, pouting in a way that made Jean shake against Tadashi with another bout of giggles. “And he needs to start working on…on making you a body like mine. So you can be more than just…some AI butler he cooked up.”

 

“ _I will pass along the message_ ,” Jarvis said, and Tadashi thought he heard a note amusement in the robot’s voice. He shifted in his seat to get a bit more comfortable, and Jean followed his movements, slinking into the little gap he left between himself and the armrest and leaning against him perfectly.

 

Okay, maybe the mindreading thing wasn’t _so_ annoying all the time.

 

“Oh, I won’t forget that anytime soon,” Jean whispered into his ear, and Tadashi rolled his eyes.

 

“What have I gotten myself into?” he asked. Jean simply placed a smooch against his ear, poking at her phone while Hiro stared at the TV, which was doing a little exposé on Big Hero 6, speculating on who they could be, what their powers were, and what their future plans were.

 

“I am so not a biological experiment,” Fred said, sounding mildly offended. “I’m a…what am I, Tadashi?”

 

“You’re an inhuman,” Tadashi said. “For whatever reason, aliens decided centuries ago that your ancestors needed to turn into giant kaiju lizard things.”

 

“Uh, who needs a reason for that?” Fred said with a grin. “Aliens were pretty smart centuries ago.”

 

“Tadashi, maybe the aliens will come back to see how their experiments turned out!” Hiro said. “That would be so freaking awesome!”

 

“Awesome is a word,” Tadashi said. “I’m happy just dealing with all of the bull – “

 

“Stuff?” Jean said with a pointed look at the young impressionable sibling staring up at Tadashi with an admiring smile.

 

“Bullstuff?” Aiko snorted from her chair.

 

“Bullstuff!” Reiko echoed with a smile.

 

“Now I just want steak,” Fred said, staring up at the ceiling with an undue amount of interest. “Who’s up for some Outback Steakhouse? I’ll buy if someone drives.”

 

“I’m driving,” Aiko said, already standing. “Let’s hit it.”

 

“Aw, you guys are leaving?” Hiro said, his lower lip puckered out in a little pout. Jean sat up and stared at Tadashi, her expression mirroring his little brother’s.

 

“We’re all leaving,” he said, reaching out to tousle his little brother’s hair. “C’mon, kiddo, you’re going with us.”

 

“Steak!” Hiro sang, hurrying along behind the group as they filed out of the living room. Tadashi paused at the door, turning back to see that Madelyne and Jarvis hadn’t moved from their spots, Madelyne staring ponderously down at the cup of coffee she’d been given before looking up at Tadashi.

 

“Oh,” she said, smiling at Tadashi. “I think I’ll just stay here with Jarvis. I’m sure he’d probably, um…maybe cause a bit of a scene if we took him to dinner, and…well, I don’t have to eat anyway. I’d hate to just leave him here, all alone.”

 

Tadashi smiled, nodding at the pair. “Well, he’s lucky to have such a caring friend,” he said, and Madelyne smiled warmly at him. “You two have fun. We’ll be back soon.”

 

“Tadashi,” Maddie said as Tadashi made to leave, and he paused, peering back into the room. “Um…thank you. For…for everything. This has all been…so strange, but also exciting, and…and I owe so much of it to you.”

 

“Don’t mention it,” Tadashi said, grinning at Maddie. “You just take care of Jarvis.”

 

He was rewarded with one of the most genuine smiles he’d ever seen from Maddie, a small laugh escaping from the construct’s lips.

 

“I will,” she said softly. “Always.”

 

….

 

“D’aw, doesn’t that just make you feel all warm and fuzzy inside?” Edpool asked, placing a cigar in his mouth (again, no easy feat with his mask on) and striking a match on his knee to light it. Taking a few puffs, he let a smoke ring float into the air, watching it dissipate as he scratched the little doggo in his lap behind the ears. “This weird little homemade universe’s version of Vision is just fun, isn’t it? She’s just trying her best to be human while dealing with her crush on Jarvis. And in case any of you are wondering, spoiler alert, he’s gonna get his own body, and it’s just gonna be adorable.”

 

He took a sip of his wineglass before puffing at his cigar, tapping some ashes into a tray near his chair.

 

“So! That seems like a good place to wrap up this little chapter,” he said with a nod. “There’s a few more of these little interludes planned, but if any of you have any input, suggestions, questions, whatever, you send them right in in the form of a review!”

 

He cooed at the little dachshund in his lap, scritching at the dog’s tummy as he watched the little canine’s tail wag furiously left to right. His four-legged companion gave a short bark, and Edpool sighed, chuckling softly.

 

“Alright, alright, so you get a small preview of the next chapter,” he said. “We’re gonna get a bit more of Dr. Strange, and we’ll get to see Peter dealing with his future daughter _and_ his future baby-mama, Emma Frost. That just sounds delightfully awkward, doesn’t it? Stay tuned, everyone!”

 

With that, he took a final sip of his wine, watching as the camera panned up to show his sitting room with him perched in his chair, patting his dog on the tummy as everything faded to black.

 

 


	22. Chapter 22

Illyana had never dreamt of greatness. She’d never imagined for a moment that she would rule over anything, never once in her short life thought to herself that she would command more than the attention of her doting older brother.

 

Despite that, through circumstances that would be considered strange even if she hadn’t already been a mutant, she’d found herself transported away from her very plane of existence and dumped on one that bent itself to the will of the strongest inhabitant. Apparently, for the moment, that had meant her. After a series of adventures straight out of a Tolkien novel, she had wound up usurping the throne of Limbo from a rather shady fellow, crowning herself Queen.

 

Almost immediately afterward, she had whisked herself back home to the plane of Earth.

 

And that had been it. She’d found herself apprenticed to Dr. Stephen Strange, a sorcerer with a keen understanding of meta-natural forces and one of the few people on this entire plane of existence able to sympathize with her experience. She’d left Limbo behind and channeled her experience into Dr. Strange’s lessons on calling forth extradimensional energies from all sorts of realities. She felt a keen connection to Limbo, but she could use her now innate connection to another reality to form similar bonds to further planes.

 

Never once had she considered that she would have to _visit_ said planes.

 

Never once had she taken a moment to ponder that she might have to go _back_ to Limbo.

 

“Nyet,” she said. “Absolutely not. I refuse.”

 

“Illyana,” Stephen beseeched her, but she gave a resolute shake of her head.

 

“I will not go back there,” she insisted. “I…I cannot.”

 

“Listen, I know exactly what you’re going through,” Stephen said. “Do you think I just skip off to the Dark Dimension whenever it needs my attention?  I died a thousand deaths at the hands of Dormammu, and if you don’t think I remember every single one in visceral detail every time I have to go back to his realm, you’re crazier than I already know you are.”  


Illyana couldn’t stop a reluctant smile at his words, and Stephen grinned wryly back at her.

 

“Six years….” She pouted up at Stephen, and he reached out and tousled her hair.

 

“The life of a Sorcerer Supreme isn’t always about wowing people with a few spells and lounging around the Sanctum Sanctorum,” he said. “There are untold amounts of extradimensional realms out there, and a few of them need some routine maintenance once  in a while.”

 

“But _this_ realm stole away years of my life,” Illyana said, knowing that she probably sounded like a petulant teenager, but she’d never even gotten to be a petulant _child_ thanks to the very realm they were about to visit.

 

“It’ll do you no good to look at the past with regret,” Stephen said. “Sometimes life deals you an unfair hand, and you can sit and mope about it or just accept that it’s out of your control and do what you can to work with it. Life doesn’t care how you feel about it. Getting mad at life won’t make it suddenly realize what an asshole it’s been and improve matters. You’ll just be pissing and moaning while it passes you by, giving you every opportunity to make your own good luck. Trust me. I’ve been there.”

 

Illyana huffed; he was right, of course, as he tended to be. One didn’t become the Sorcerer Supreme without accumulating a lot of nuggets of wisdom. Saying no more, she held out her sword, feeling the ground beneath them melt and open up, tendrils of the twisting ether wrapping around them and yanking them along a spiraling path through space and time until, only seconds later, they were standing in Limbo.

 

Only it looked…rather different.

 

“What the…?” Illyana trailed off. “What has happened to this place?”

 

Before them, what were once verdant green hills had been strip-mined, carving away the land to reveal glowing crystal minerals. Even as they watched, metal trucks with large all-terrain treads trundled away down a road toward a large city in the distance. In the sky above it, small enough from this distance to look like a model, a castle floated on an island suspended by the very magics in the air.

 

“You said yourself that Limbo reacts to its ruler and reshapes itself,” Stephen said, staring out over what had once been beautiful rolling hills. “Apparently, someone else took over.”

 

“But…but I would have noticed,” Illyana said, shaking her head. “I…I would have…. Limbo is my domain.”

 

“It _was_ ,” Stephen said, “for those years you were here before, Limbo had a tight hold on you. Belasco had tied you to this realm. Once he was gone, you had nothing keeping you from Earth, and you snapped back.”

 

“But I can channel energies from Limbo,” she said, looking around. Now that she was here, the fear she’d had of this place was gone, replaced by indignation on behalf of her former home. Belasco was gone, and with him any resentment she felt toward the actual realm of Limbo. Now, all she wanted to do was find out who was turning it into some steampunk medieval empire.

 

“You can channel the energies because it’s a familiar realm,” Stephen said, “but it’s not home anymore. Someone else has taken on Limbo as their home, and I have a feeling I know who – “

 

“ _Intruders_!” a metallic voice said, sounding like metal scraping against rock, and the pair were suddenly surrounded by some kind of iron golems. Five metal monsters with barrel-shaped bodies, small legs, and large gorilla arms landed heavily around them, shaking the ground with their impacts. They turned small, oblong heads that had only two glowing green eyes in them, the eyes seeming to peer through Illyana. “ _Level nine magical incursion detected! Please do not resist while you are detained in the name of Baron Doom_!”

 

“Yep, that sounds about right,” Stephen said, taking to the air and holding his hands out in front of him. Arcane circles appeared in front of his fingers, bright blue orbs emerging from them and bolting down toward two of the beasts. Illyana raised his sword as one of them reared back a meaty metal hand.

 

“ _Resistance detected_!” it said. “ _Countermeasures will be_ – “

 

Illyana didn’t let it finish its prepared speech, leaping up and landing on its shoulders. She jammed her sword into what accounted for the beast’s neck, channeling a burst of arcane fire that shot out of the tip and dislodged the oblong head of the golem.

 

“ _Tar-tar-targeting mat-t-trix compromised_!”

 

She held her sword aloft, channeling a bolt of lightning and ramming it down into the hole left by the detached head. The golem burst apart, and Illyana flipped away, spinning through the air to land atop another of them. This one had enough time to prepare an attack, though, and the head spun to fix her with a beady green gaze that grew alarmingly bright.

 

_Zzung! SHOOM!_

 

She leapt away just as a beam of green energy shot out at her, landing and sinking into a portal that carried her behind another golem. Thankfully, the creatures were not that smart, as a second beam lanced through her hiding spot.

 

“ _F-friendly fire detec_ – “

 

The golem said no more, landing in a heap as Illyana dodged its huge body. She leapt atop the boulder of the beast’s torso and raised her sword, channeling a burst of fire that wreathed her blade in intense flames, hot enough that her hand felt uncomfortably warm holding it. The trigger-happy golem was readying another beam of green light as she hurtled her sword at it, a molten orange disk of light forming as it spun rapidly in the air, slicing through the golem like a hot knife through butter.

 

She had just enough time to relish in her victory before the sound of another of the beasts readying its eye-beam sounded just behind her, and she didn’t have her sword.

 

This might hurt.

 

_Zzung!_

 

The beam shot out, but time seemed to slow as a ball of shadowy energy shot at the creature. Time wasn’t slowing, though, Illyana realized. The _light_ was. It seemed to pause before the shadow ball simply sucked it up, tendrils of green now pulsating along its surface as it hurled itself at the golem, sinking into its chest before bursting outward, sending shrapnel flying. Illyana covered herself, but a translucent shield of orange light was already blocking the metal shards. She looked up to see Stephen approaching her, his hand held out. He lowered it, and the shield dissipated.

 

“Who – “ Illyana began, but he held up a hand, glancing around.

 

“Clea?” he called.

 

A soft giggle reached their ears, and from the shadow of a nearby tree, a robed figure seemed to grow into existence, reaching two pale arms up to push a hood back. She had long blonde locks that spilled over her shoulders once freed from the hood, so light they were almost a platinum color. Blue eyes danced with amusement as they fixed on Stephen, blood red lips quirking in a playful smile.

 

“Hello, Stephen,” she said in a husky voice.

 

“Clea,” Stephen said again, a smile pulling at his lips. “How’s the Dark Dimension?”

 

“Well, my dear uncle has been trapped in a pocket dimension after your last little spat with him,” Clea said.

 

“Those are always fun,” Stephen chuckled. “So who’s running things?”

 

“Actually, mother is in charge,” she says. “She sends her everlasting hatred for imprisoning her brother.”

 

“Odd that she let you save my life, then,” Stephen said, and Clea smirked, glancing at Illyana and then over at the floating castle in the distance.

 

“Oh, normally she would tell me to have nothing to do with you, not that I would listen,” Clea winked, “but mother is growing more and more uneasy about this…Doom fellow.”

 

“Victor von Doom,” Stephen said. “He’s from back home. We tangled once, and he got sucked into Limbo.”

 

“Well, he’s really taken a shine to the place, as you can see,” she said, gesturing around them. “Mother’s worried he might try to actually invade the Dark Dimension.”

 

“Could he do that?” Stephen asked.

 

“He certainly looks like he’s getting ready for some sort of invasion,” Clea said. “He’s mustering his forces for something.”

 

“How could I have let it get this bad?” Illyana asked herself as she stared once more at the floating palace, lurking on the skyline like some monument to her failure, mocking her with its very presence. This Baron Doom lurked in that palace, lording over Limbo like some despot.

 

“There was no way you could have known what was happening,” Stephen soothed her. “Limbo is meant to exist in a constant state of change. It’s literally the realm of In-Between.”

 

“Who’s this?” Clea asked, peering down at Illyana. “New student?”

 

“This is Illyana,” Stephen said. “Illyana, this is Clea. She’s a former student of mine.”

 

“Former student, now just an admirer and occasional helper,” Clea said with a fond look at her old instructor. “Though, things in the Dark Dimension are getting a little crazy, so maybe I could crash with you after all of this is over?”

 

“I don’t see why not,” Stephen said. “So, do we have a plan?”

 

“Well, as you can see by his golems, Baron Doom favors the intimidation method of control,” Clea said. “So I’m sure there are plenty of disgruntled subjects willing to get behind a cause like overthrowing their tyrannical leader.”

 

“But tyrants also attract some pretty rabid followers,” Stephen said. “Better to stand in his shadow than block his path.”

 

“Meaning he’s bound to have a very loyal fan base as well,” Clea finished. “The zealous sort of cult following that’s willing to die for a cause.”

 

“Far be it from us to deny them their dream,” Stephen said, glancing down at Illyana. “Are you ready, Magik? Time to topple a baron and restore peace to the people.”

 

“And show this Doom fellow what happens when you try to run the show in Limbo,” Illyana added, retrieving her sword. “Let’s go.”

 

……

 

“Oh, that should be exciting!” Edpool said. “A little magical trek across a land of fantasy to topple a king. Sounds like a Tolkien novel or something. Probably. At least a Peter Jackson movie.”

 

He was once again seated in his chair, a plate of crab cakes sitting next to him. He reached for one and popped it in his mouth, wincing a bit at the flavor.

 

“Ew,” he said, gulping it down with distaste. “Okay, I thought crab cakes were supposed to be this delicious rich-people food, but I can’t say I’m a fan. Narrator, wanna narrate a pizza for me?”

 

He sat back into his seat, carefully holding up the slice of pepperoni pizza, and took a bite, a noise of satisfaction sounding as he looked over at the steaming-hot box wafting its delicious aroma through the room.

 

“Much better,” he said with relish, glancing up as the door, left ajar, suddenly coasted inward, bumped by a little canine nose. “Oh, someone smelled pizza. Hey, li’l fella.”

 

Dachspool cantered over to Edpool’s feet, leaning off of one paw to stare up at him with his tail wagging madly. Chuckling, Edpool dropped a piece of pizza, and the dapper doggo caught it up in his teeth, chewing laboriously at it while Edpool took another bite of his own.

 

“So, while we chow down on some good-ass pizza, why don’t you guys look in on what Thor’s been up to?”

 

……

 

God, but she would miss the view.

 

Watching from the Bifrost as Yggdrasil sprawled away and stretched into the distance, the Nine Realms awaiting on her celestial boughs, Natasha took a moment to just soak it all in, the sheer otherworldly awe she always felt when she looked upon the vast expanse of space around her. She could understand why astronauts came back from space with such a changed worldview.

 

Things looked a lot smaller from up here.

 

“The All-Father awaits you in his throne room,” a deep voice said behind her, and she turned to look up at the gatekeeper of Asgard. Heimdall’s bright gold eyes stared down at her, and if she hadn’t known the stoic keeper of the Bifrost for years, she wouldn’t have caught the slight hint of pity in his gaze.

 

“Heimdall,” she said, hating how chocked her voice sounded. “Was I good? Did I…did I do well?”

 

Heimdall studied her for a long moment, soon gracing her with a rare smile.

 

“I have watched the hammer passed down from Keeper to Keeper for centuries,” he said. “You were the first female, and by far, you were the most interesting of all of them.”

 

She smiled wryly right back at him.

 

“I’ll take that as a compliment,” she said, moving past him. “If I don’t see you again…it was an honor to work with you.”

 

“The honor was mine, Miss Romanova,” Heimdall said. “I shall see you in Valhalla.”

 

She raised her hand in a final farewell, exiting the Bifrost and passing along the bridge of ice that led the way to the palace, her ears echoing with those fateful words from Bruunhilde.

 

_“My Lady, the second son of Odin, Loki, has perished. But we have…we have located the God of Thunder. We have found him.”_

 

It was unprecedented, unheard of. For hundreds of years, Asgard had spoken of the return of Thor like some sort of impossibility, a pipe dream, in the same tones they had used to refer to Ragnarok or the death of Odin. They hadn’t wanted to taunt themselves with the possibility that it could have been true.

 

But now it was.

 

And the Asgardians were jubilant. Even as she approached the palace, the joyous sounds of celebrations only beginning echoed along the halls of the palace. Asgard had their prince back, and they wanted all of the Nine Realms to know.

 

Natalia was…less excited. She was simply out of a job.

 

Mjolnir felt heavier and heavier in her grip as she climbed the steps to the palace and made her way inside, passing through the great entrance hall. The palace guards sprung a crisp final salute as she passed by, and she managed a meager smile for them.

 

“My lady,” one of them said as she moved past, “the royal guard wishes you well. It has been an honor.”

 

“Likewise,” she said. “You…don’t let this place fall apart without me.”

 

She was rewarded with a chuckle.

 

“We’ll do our best,” the guard said as the massive doors leading to the throne room opened with a muted groan.

 

Where Natalia had expected a teeming congregation of Asgardians welcoming back their prince, she saw only Odin, resting heavily in his throne, a smile beaming from behind his beard. Freyja stood next to him, at his right hand, smiling warmly at Natalia. The acting Goddess of Thunder’s attention, though, was drawn to the blond figure standing at the base of the stairs leading up to the throne. He was powerful-looking, radiating a presence that Natalia could feel just looking at him. He looked young, only nineteen or twenty by Midgardian years, and rumors of his death and subsequent reincarnation during the Galactic Wars rang truer the more she looked upon his fresh face and youthful eyes.

 

He was actually kind of cute.

 

She reached the base of the throne, reaching up to remove her helmet before taking a knee and placing it next to her. She placed Mjolnir in front of her, remembering the ceremonial show of deference to the All-Father. Placing her right arm over her breast she spent a moment in “reverence” before looking up to Odin, who stood and gazed upon her.

 

“Natalia Romanova,” he said, and to his credit, his pronounced her name perfectly, no doubt used to the myriad of Keepers and their many divers names, “stand, and do so proudly.”

 

She stood, leaving her helmet and Mjolnir, and looked up to meet Odin’s one-eyed gaze.

 

“For centuries, I have seen Keeper after Keeper come through my throne room, watched as Midgardians from all walks of life have wielded the power of Thor, carried a burden meant to be shouldered by my own blood in the absence of the rightful holder of the power of the God of Thunder,” Odin said. “When I saw you, a woman, present the hammer to me, I at first thought that my enchantment had…worn thin.”

 

He broke off at a small discontented noise from his wife, offering her a short rueful smile.

 

“However,” he said, “you have proven yourself just as worthy, if not more so, than any man that wielded the hammer before you. Despite your short time as the Goddess of Thunder, you have handled the responsibility of the great power the hammer represents admirably. You have protected and defended Midgard well, and you should be proud of what you’ve achieved.”

 

Natalia nodded, dipping her head in a little half-bow to the All-Father.

 

“Thank you, All-Father,” she said, looking back up to Odin, who nodded back before continuing.

 

“Perhaps the strange circumstances of the latest Keeper were a harbinger of the change you would be witness to,” he said. “While my kingdom mourns the loss of one of its own, we also rejoice in the return of our prodigal son. My son, step forward.”

 

The young blond made his way over to Natalia, and when she met eyes with him, he gave her a respectful nod.

 

“Miss Romanova,” he said, his voice youthful but strong, “if I may?”

 

He gestured at the hammer, and Natalia took a step back, watching with a pang of remorse as Thor reached down and gripped the handle. As his fingers curled around the hammer, she felt a sense of…detachment. She’d never needed glasses, but she imagined that it would feel the same to take them off, leaving things fuzzy and out of focus. Everything Mjolnir had given her, everything the hammer represented, was leaving her, being pulled away and given to the rightful bearer of the power. Thor hefted Mjolnir like it was his birthright, which it was, in actuality. He raised the hammer above his head, and a thunderclap sounded, lightning flashing in the distance. If anything, the revels around them grew stronger, the palace shaking with celebration. Natalia looked up to see Odin gazing upon his son with approval. Freyja was nodding with satisfaction.

 

Thor was…studying her, his gaze calculating as he searched her. He made his way over, sliding the hammer into a harness at his side.

 

“Miss…Romanova,” he said, “I must thank you. Thank you for acting in my absence, and thank you for returning Mjolnir to me. I am sorry that your time with the hammer was cut short.”

 

“Oh…no, it’s no problem,” Natalia said. “It’s your hammer, I was just holding onto it.”

 

“Even so, you have done me a great service in wielding it while I was unable,” Thor said. “Should you ever require my assistance, I would be happy to render whatever aid I can to you and your…Avengers.”

 

“Well, Director Fury will be happy to hear that,” Natalia said with a small smirk. “In the meantime, you should probably be catching up with your family and celebrating. I’d hate to impose.”

 

“I promise you, Miss Romanova, you will never impose upon the house of Odin,” Thor said. “Would you like me to escort you back to Heimdall?”

 

“No, no, that’s quite alright,” Natalia said, suddenly eager to be done with this place, to be away from this fantasy land of gods and monsters and aliens and…untold power that was no longer hers. The absence of Mjolnir was starting to settle in, leaving her feeling…tired. “I think I’d just like to head…head home.”

 

“Please,” Thor said, holding the hammer up. With a resounding _crack_ , a hole seemed to appear in reality itself, a tear in space that revealed the same room Natalia had been standing in before she had used the hammer for this very purpose, to convey herself across worlds, along the branches of Yggdrasil to the Bifrost. “If you ever need anything, Asgard owes you a debt.”

 

“I’ll remember that,” Natalia said, nodding to Thor before stepping through the portal. The tear seemed to mend itself behind her, leaving her standing in a meeting room. A quiet, mundane meeting room filled with a ringing silence, her ears still echoing with the otherworldly sounds of Asgard. She had just been standing in a throne room older than she could comprehend, passing along a weapon of myth to its rightful owner.

 

And now she was standing in a broken-down meeting room, slumping into an ergonomic office chair around a large particle board table. The SHIELD building had seen better days, and she had heard rumors that they were planning to simply pick up and rebuild, to settle onto a manmade island in the bay with all the facilities that were needed to maintain a nation now packed to the brim with superpowered individuals.

 

Would they even need her? Before, she had been the acting Goddess of Thunder, a powerhouse able to go toe-to-toe with the Hulk, to beat down the most powerful villains the world had to throw at SHIELD. Now, she was…just a former KGB operative. A spy, an agent, a girl that had been dragged along as a captive and plunked into a chair across from James Rogers himself, who had turned his gaze up to Clint Barton asking what the Black Widow was doing sitting at his desk.

 

_“You told me to find her, not kill her.”_

 

Well, at least one person in this world had cared for her.

 

“Nat?”

 

She looked up, blinking when she saw the very man she had just been pondering. Clint stepped into the room, peering curiously at her.

 

“I heard some kinda noise, thought I’d come take a look,” he said. “All done with your Asgard business? Back among us mere mortals?”

 

“For good,” Natalia said. “Thor’s back.”

 

Clint stared at her for a moment, the meaning of her words sinking before he sighed and made his way over, sinking into a chair next to hers.

 

“Well,” he said, and she felt his hand pressing into her jaw, pulling her gaze up to meet his, “you alright?”

 

“Of course,” she said immediately.

 

“Nat,” he said, and Natalia sighed, shaking her head.

 

“How’d the bar hold up in all this?” she said, gesturing around them at the blown-out building. Apparently, there had been a bit of craziness going on while she had been handling some business in Alfheim.

 

“I could probably scrounge us up a few drinks,” Clint said.

 

“Can you set me up with a few of your famous Arrowheads?” she said, knowing how proud he was of his signature mixture of vodka, rum, orange juice, and cranberry juice.

 

“You bet,” he said, standing and holding out a hand. “C’mon. You don’t need Asgard to keep things interesting. Trust me.”

 

……

 

Gwen Stacy was…uncomfortable.

 

There was a tense feeling in her wrists, like there was something in them just waiting for her to make the wrong movement before –

 

_Thawp-thawp!_

 

“Oh noooo!” she whined, yanking at her wrists, trying not to pay too much attention to the fact that long, silken threads were now sprouting from them, attached to the ground and the lovely little tree growing in the Parkers’ front yard. Detach, detach, detach, detach –

 

_Scrick._

 

Ew. That still just felt weird. Even so, the webs were detached, and there was a strange, unexplainable pressure that had been lifted from her wrists, leaving her to close the distance to the front door of Peter’s house without having to worry about webbing all over the place.

 

School was just going to be hell today.

 

She raised a finger and poked at the doorbell, and seconds after the ding sounded, the door opened to reveal Uncle Ben smiling down at her.

 

“There she is,” he said with a grin. “We were just wondering if you got lost or something.”

 

“Oh, gosh, how late am I?” Gwen asked with a smirk, and Ben chuckled.

 

“Four whole minutes, young lady,” he said. “Aunt May was just about to call your dad and file a missing person’s report.”

 

“I’m so sorry I worried you so much,” Gwen said. “However can I make it up to you?”

 

“You just make sure you don’t worry Pete, huh?” Uncle Ben told her, and Gwen giggled softly.

 

“I can promise that,” she said. “Definitely.”

 

Uncle Ben chortled, stepping back to let her head for the stairs.

 

“I know you can,” he said. “You just go drag our boy out of bed, hm?”

 

“Bacon and eggs?” Gwen asked, grinning as she made her way for the stairs, and Uncle Ben smiled, turning to call toward the kitchen.

 

“May, we’re being extorted,” he said. Seconds later, Aunt May poked her head out from the dining room, smiling and shooting a wink at Gwen.

 

“It’s not extortion if a woman knows a man would fall apart without her,” she said, “it’s called female empowerment.”

 

“Well, I’m obviously out of my depth, here,” Uncle Ben said, holding his hands up in defeat, an amused grin spreading over his face. “Gwen, you just go drag Pete out of bed, and try not to break his poor sensibilities with your female empowerment revolution, alright? Break it to him gently.”

 

“I’ll make sure his worldview isn’t too shattered,” Gwen said with a grin, and Uncle Ben and Aunt May just shunted her upstairs.

 

Gwen climbed the steps, emerging onto the landing and crossing the short distance to Pete’s room before knocking softly on his door. On the other side, she heard a gasp followed by a muted flump. Of course, both sounds were sufficiently muffled that she felt she could only hear them because of her enhanced hearing, courtesy of the strange nature of the spider bites from the day before.

 

“Pete?” she called softly through his door. “Hey, it’s me.”

 

“I seriously think I just punched my mattress a little,” Pete’s voice said from the other side of the door, and Gwen couldn’t stop a small giggle as she wiggled the doorknob to his room.

 

“Well, I hope you’re decent, because I’m coming in there,” she said, poking her head in. She saw Peter lying on top of a bundle of his blankets on the floor, rolling onto his side to peer up at Gwen. He looked…good. Without his glasses, his blue eyes seemed so much more prominent, and without a shirt on, well….

 

That spider bite had done wonders for his physique.

 

“We have superpowers,” he pointed out. “Something about those spiders gave us superpowers, and I’m not mentally ready to deal with that.”

 

“Then just…forget about it for now,” Gwen said, smiling down at him before crouching to peer more closely at him. “We’ll have to process it later, but we have a whole day of school to deal with, and you have a girlfriend that would be mad at you if you just skipped school. Plus, like…I’d be pretty upset, too.”

 

“Well, I’d hate to piss of two of the most important girls in my life,” Peter said, and Gwen winked, sticking her tongue out.

 

“Especially because I have superpowers and can kick your butt more than ever,” she said, holding her hands out and wiggling her fingers menacingly. “You better watch yo – “

 

_Thawp-thawp!_

 

“Holy shit!”

 

“Oh, fuck!”

 

Gwen jumped back, earning a startled yell as Peter was tugged from his blankets by twin strands of webbing, rolling to the floor with a flump. He crawled to his feet while Gwen attempted to detach the webbing, tugging her wrists to try to yank it free. This only pulled Peter off his feet just as he was standing, and he yelped as he dropped to the floor once more.

 

“Gwen, just stop, hold sti—oof!”

 

“Pete, I’m sorry!” Gwen said, giggling despite herself. “I’m so sorry!”

 

“What is going on in there?” Aunt May’s voice came from the other side of the door. “You two aren’t playing that Forts game again, are you?”

 

“Aunt May, we haven’t played Forts in like five years,” Peter said as Gwen hurriedly detached the webs from him, rolling them up into a ball and stuffing them out of sight in his closet. “Gwen just scared the crap out of me waking me up.”

 

“She’s just trying to make sure you’re not late for school because you’re a lazy-bones,” Aunt May chided him, laughter in her voice. “Get down here and get some breakfast when you’re done roughhousing.”

 

“Yes, Aunt May,” Peter drawled out, and they listened as her footsteps creaked down the stairs. He peered up at Gwen, blinking dubiously. “Since when am I a lazy-bones?”

 

“Since literally ever,” Gwen said, helping him to his feet. “C’mon, lazy-bones, let’s eat. I’m starving.”

 

……

 

“And why is that day sticking out so prominently, Peter?”

 

“I dunno, it’s…” Peter trailed off, staring up at Charlene with those baby-blues, and she felt herself smile back at him. He was a cutie, that was for sure. “It was the first time I lied to Aunt May without even like thinking about it. I just…made up a story.”

 

“You were dealing with some pretty serious changes in your life,” Charlene said, scribbling at her clipboard as she spoke. “What do you think would have happened if you’d told her?”

 

“She’d probably…freak out or something,” Peter said. “I mean, I was just afraid we’d get taken away to some lab and never see the light of day again. Now I know, Norman Osborn would have just studied us for a few days, SHIELD might have gotten involved, but…back then, I was just…terrified.”

 

“You were afraid of an upheaval in your life,” Charlene concluded.

 

“I just wanted to keep things as…normal as possible for as long as I could,” Peter said, nodding. “I had to…deal with it.”

 

“It’s always a little scary when we first run into something we know our parents can’t help us with,” Charlene told him. “For the longest time, Mom and Dad have been the solution, and suddenly, you know they’d be just as confused by you by this whole thing. It’s our first step toward independence, toward becoming an adult. You had to deal with it much sooner than most, though.”

 

“I’m not even old enough to drive yet,” he grumbled, and Charlene smiled at him.

 

“You’ve had to deal with a lot that most boys your age would never even dream of,” she said. “But that’s why we’re here. SHIELD knows you’re going through a lot, so I’m happy to listen.”

 

“What’s it like?” he asked, and Charlene frowned a bit in confusion.

 

“What’s what like?”

 

“I mean…being a therapist is like…listening and empathizing and helping people sort through stuff, right?” he asked, and she nodded. That was a broad but accurate description of her job. “But a therapist for someone like…me or like Riley or the other Watch members, it’s like…how do you empathize with that? We deal with a lot of stuff I don’t think you’d ever come across in your life. Not to sound arrogant, which…I actually kinda do. Sorry about that.”

 

“No, you don’t sound arrogant at all,” Charlene said, shaking her head with a small laugh. “That’s actually a good question. They told me you were smart. I guess…humanity is universal, you know? Maybe I’m just a girl from Staten Island, but I’ve always felt like I was really good at putting myself in other people’s shoes. I don’t know what it’s like to swing around between buildings or have a gun pointed at me or…wake up one day in a guy’s body and find out I’m a clone of myself.”

 

Peter let a gruff sigh at that, and Charlene smiled at him.

 

“I don’t know what that’s like,” she said. “Most therapists don’t know personally what their patients are dealing with. They’ve never experience it firsthand. But that’s also sort of the reason we exist. There are some situations that only a few people have ever gone through. But they need someone to listen. They need someone to try to understand what they’re dealing with. That’s one of the reasons I got into this particular branch of my job. People like you, you do truly amazing things. But you also tend to attract the most persuasive demons. So I want to help. I want to make sure you know that you’re not alone.”

 

“That’s pretty cool,” Pete said.

 

“Well, that’s high praise from the leader of the Neighborhood Watch,” Charlene said, giggling at the look on Peter’s face.

 

“I still just kinda cringe a bit at the name,” he admitted.

 

“But your friends came up with it and they loved it,” Charlene guessed. She apparently got it right, because Pete just shook his head.

 

“How’d you know?” he asked.

 

“You’re selfless,” Charlene said. “More than anything, you’re a selfless man. Even something like the name of your supergroup is the sort of thing you would let your friends decide if they came up with something and stuck with it.”

 

“They stuck with it for so long,” Peter sighed with an exasperated smile, and Charlene couldn’t stop a soft snort.

 

“Would you like to tell me about them?” she asked. “Your friends?”

 

“Pft, where do I start?” he replied. “There’s only about twenty of them now.”

 

“From the beginning,” Charlene told him. “All the best stories start there, right?”

 

“True,” Peter acknowledged with a nod. “Alright. From the beginning.”

 

……

 

Mary Jane Watson hated feeling normal.

 

It wasn’t to say that she hated people _thinking_ she was normal. She didn’t much care what others thought of her. She just didn’t want to _feel_ normal. Life had to be interesting, extraordinary. Even if she only just knew extraordinary people, that was enough.

 

The fact that she _was_ an extraordinary person was, thus, pretty much a godsend. Not only was she the sort of special type that she had only previously admired, she could help out the boy that meant the very most to her in this world. And Peter Parker needed all the help he could get these days. At the very least, out here in California, spending the summer in a beach house miles upon miles away from their “turf”, Pete had no other choice but to relax. All of them, really, would be spending the next few months on a well-deserved vacation.

 

Thus, it was a bit of a surprise when the doorbell rang one morning; there had been no talk of a pizza order or any sort of delivery, and Tony had just visited a day or two ago. Other than that, they didn’t get any visitors.

 

Mary Jane was closest to the front door, on her way back from the bathroom, so she altered course and trotted down the stairs of Tony’s rather palatial Los Angeles manor. It was a hot California day, the air humid with the promise of a good rainfall in the evening. Thankfully, Tony spared no expense, so an extensive climate control system kept the air cool and dry inside.

 

“Um…hi,” Mary Jane said as she opened the front door, peering out. Two people of apparent Asian descent stood there, one a boy a bit older than MJ, the other a girl that had to be his older sister, probably barely an adult.

 

“Hello,” the boy said, his tone polite and proper, his words perfectly enunciated. “My name is Amadeus Cho. Is there a Mary Jane Watson staying here?”

 

Mary Jane felt herself tense a bit at his words; not many people outside of SHIELD knew she was staying here. How did this boy know of her?

 

“I can assure you, neither of us have any…ill intent,” the boy said, obviously sensing her mistrust. “I’m a scientist. I actually work with SHIELD. They sent me your way after a bit of a breakthrough I had back at my lab.”

 

“…What?” Mary Jane peered over at him, glancing between him and the other girl.

 

“Hear me out,” the boy said, and Mary Jane nodded. “Some time ago, you had a dream. A very vivid dream about your friend, Peter Parker.”

 

“You said you’re with SHIELD?” Mary Jane asked warily.

 

“Yes, I swear to you,” the boy said with a little smile. Mary Jane heard footsteps behind her and turned to see Peter head down the stairs. He made his way over and draped an arm over Mary Jane’s shoulders, prompting her to nestle against him.

 

“Pete, this is…Amadeus?” Mary Jane said.

 

“Amadeus Cho,” the boy introduced himself again. Mary Jane looked up to see Pete glaring at Amadeus, who looked a bit bemused at the icy reception. “Um…you’re Peter Parker?”

 

“What are you doing here?” Pete asked, his voice thin and suspicious.

 

“He’s with SHIELD,” Mary Jane assured him, turning and smiling up at Peter, reaching up to gently place her hands on his chest. “C’mon, how else would he know we’re here?”

 

“I’m simply here to ask your friend some questions about Miss Watson’s coma several weeks ago,” Amadeus Cho said. “We have reason to believe that while she was unconscious, her spirit visited another reality.”

 

Mary Jane blinked and turned around in Peter’s arms, staring at Amadeus. She glanced up at the girl with him, who just snorted.

 

“Yeah,” was all she said.

 

“And who are you?” Mary Jane asked.

 

“I’m his sister,” the girl said. “Call me Maddy. I’m just a chaperone. Kids his age aren’t allowed to wander around alone, after all.”

 

“Patronizing,” Amadeus muttered, and Maddy rolled her eyes. Amadeus turned back to Mary Jane, smiling at her. “If it’s not too much to ask, I’d love to come in and ask you a few questions about your experience.”

 

“In another reality?” Mary Jane asked with a raised brow. Still, given how vivid the dream had felt, the sounds and smells that had seemed so real at the time…well, the world was already a pretty strange place. “Are there a lot of those?”

 

“We postulate that there could be an infinite number of alternate realities, growing and spreading, blooming out of each other,” Amadeus said, his voice fervent. “We’ve…seen hints, touched on the walls between them, but we can’t break through, not on a physical level yet. But you and Jean Gray touched another plane of existence on a real, measurable level. If we could just document your experience, you could help us with a major breakthrough.”

 

“Well, I do love talking about myself,” Mary Jane said, smiling up at Pete. “It could be fun.”

 

Pete smiled right back, and Mary Jane felt her heart melt just a little at how warm the expression was.

 

“Well, I’d hate to deny you some fun,” he said. “Want me to leave you to it, or…?”

 

“No, I want you to hear how fucking cute you are in this other world!” Mary Jane said, taking his hands and pulling him toward the kitchen.

 

……

 

“Peter Parker, you are entirely too cute,” Mary Jane told him, swinging to land against the wall of the alley Peter had ducked into. The soft _click-click_ of his camera had been a constant reassurance during her tussle with the Vulture; at least he had stayed hidden and not gotten himself hurt. She crawled down along the wall, unable to stop herself from grinning at the sight of the huge smile on Peter’s face. “Why are you all smiles?”

 

“You’re really doing this,” Pete said as she hopped from the wall, landing in a crouch before standing. “You saved like fifteen people today. You’re…amazing.”

 

“Aw, c’mon, Tiger, you’re making me blush,” she said with a giggle, though she couldn’t stop a pleased little wiggle at his words. He always did that, managed to make her feel like a silly girl with a crush and not the girl silly boys crushed on.

 

“It’s a shame Liz didn’t come out with us,” Pete sighed. Mary Jane only pouted behind her mask, poking him in the nose. “Ah, my nose.”

 

“You’re not having fun just the two of us?” she asked. She was rewarded with a blush blooming on his cheeks, and he smiled, shrugging a bit. “Shrug.”

 

“Sue me, I shrug a lot,” he said with a smirk, and Mary Jane hopped forward, taking his hands in hers and gently pulling him. She was a lot stronger since the spider bite, and Pete was already a pretty fragile guy. He’d been getting a bit more fit since their patrols around New York, but she still had to be careful to rein in her enthusiasm with things like hugs and pulling him along behind her. She looked back and felt her lips pull in a smile at the way his glasses made his baby blue eyes seem so big. He really was just a wide-eyed idealist, and here she was, helping him achieve his vision of cleaning up New York or something.

 

“C’mon,” she said, tugging softly and leading him along. She slid her mask off, loving the way he blushed when she smiled at him. “I wanna buy my photographer some Arby’s.”

 

“Now you’re speaking my language.”

 

……

 

American Steel was a long-dead place, an old foundry that had made metals of all sorts during World War II but had long since closed down. In the past decades, it had changed hands a number of times, but now it was condemned, a derelict relic of a time long past, doomed to be ripped down and replaced with an office building most likely. Until then, it was a popular spot for the scum of New York to carve out a living dealing drugs, selling stolen goods, or holding up between prison stints.

 

It was also the place Frank Bowers had chosen for their rather clandestine meeting.

 

“Alright, I’m here,” Chloe said, glancing nervously around. With the machinery all gutted out, there was plenty of space for a shantytown of sorts to spring up, and Frank, who sold happiness in a bottle, was the closest thing to a VIP this place had. Frank himself awaited in a ratty old couch dragged in and set up in front of beat-up camper that had simply been parked in a corner of the factory floor.

 

“What do you want, Frank?” Chloe asked, trying to inject some bravado in her voice.

 

“You know what the hell I want,” Frank said derisively. “Three thousand, and you’re lucky I don’t tack on interest.”

 

“I’ll have the money, Frank,” Chloe insisted. “I just don’t have it right now.”

 

“Yeah fuckin’ right,” Frank shot back raising a hand to point an accusing finger at Chloe. “That’s what you said the last three times. I want my money, _now_ , and I’m done waiting.”

 

Chloe didn’t respond, her attention drawn to Frank’s wrist, now exposed from under his sleeve, and Chloe saw a very familiar bracelet peeking out at her. What was Frank doing wearing a bracelet belonging to –

 

“What the fuck are you doing with that?” she asked, charging forward and reaching for his wrist. “That’s Rachel’s bracelet. Why do you have that bracelet!?”  


“Back the hell offa me!” Frank said, yanking a gun from his pocket and levelling it at Chloe, who stopped dead in her tracks. “It was a gift!”

 

“That’s bullshit!” Chloe said, her heart racing. Frank wouldn’t actually shoot her, would he? Had he…no…. Had he shot Rachel? “She wouldn’t just give that to you, she was – “

 

“Not your property!” Frank said. “Acting like you knew who she was. You didn’t know shit about her. I want my money, now! Hand it over or – “

 

“Or you’ll shoot a girl?” a new voice said, and a third person dropped into their midst, clad in a skintight red and blue suit with black web patterns across it and a stylized spider across the chest. Chloe couldn’t help but relax a bit with Max’s appearance; she would keep her safe.

 

“Who the fuck are—ah!” Frank’s words were cut off as his gun was yanked from his hands by a web, Max closing the distance between them fast enough that Chloe lost track of her for a moment before Frank was sent flying. Max took a few steps back, turning and hurrying for Chloe.

 

“We should go,” Max said, and Chloe couldn’t help but smile at how nervous she sounded. In her intimidating mask and skintight getup, Max looked like the cutest little ass-kicker, but here she was, just nervous for Chloe’s wellbeing. “Chloe, c’mon.”

 

“Where did he get that bracelet?” Chloe asked, hurrying along before any other residents came to investigate. “I know that bracelet, that belonged to Rachel.”

 

“We’ll find out, okay?” Max told her. “It doesn’t sound like he…hurt Rachel. It sounds like they knew each other.”

 

“I can’t believe Rachel would even talk to that dirtbag,” Chloe muttered.

 

“Well…could he have been her dealer?”

 

The two were out of the building, hurrying along the edge of the bay. Max was wiggling into a pair of sweats and a long-sleeve shirt, hiding her costume away as she pulled her mask off to reveal those stunning eyes of hers.

 

“I…I don’t know,” Chloe said. “Rachel liked toking it up just as much as me, but she always got her weed from me.”

 

“Could she have been into…other stuff?” Max asked.

 

“We only ever smoked weed or drank, and…maybe we popped a Molly once in a while, but she was the one who got me _off_ the hard stuff,” Chloe said. “We need to find out what Frank knows about Rachel.”

 

“We can figure that out tomorrow,” Max said, sounding a bit shaken. “I’ve had enough of people pointing guns at you, Chloe.”

 

“You were a total fucking badass back there, though!” Chloe said, grinning down at her. “Alright, c’mon, let’s hit the Two Whales. My treat. I’ll get you a Belgian waffle.”

 

“It’s two in the afternoon,” Max said, and Chloe shrugged.

 

“Breakfast just a word made up to keep you from eating the best food all day long,” she said. “We have to figure out a lot, c’mon.”

 

And Max followed, because she always did. That was how it worked; Chloe led, and Max followed behind, nervous, hesitant, and a bit afraid, but always willing to accompany Chloe into the unknown, to help her no matter what. Tugging her mask off to reveal those stunning eyes, she peered up at Chloe as Chloe peered back.

 

“I’m right behind you.”

 

……

 

“Aw, isn’t it cute?” Edpool said. “Yes, that last little bit featured Max and Chloe from the videogame Life is Strange, which every single one of you reading should play, and if you’ve already played it, play it again. Just make sure you get your permission slips signed for the feel trip. It’s a ride.”

 

He leaned back in his seat, watching as Dachspool snorted in his sleep from near the fireplace. Raising his wineglass to his lips, he took a long sip and set it back down.

 

“So, that brings this little interlude to a close,” he said. “Sorry to those that didn’t get their requests done, but rest assured, there’s one more chapter. Maybe. Possibly two. We just have a lot of ideas to sift through, and not all of them make the cut. Requests always get honored, though, so keep ‘em coming!”

 

He sipped at his wineglass one more time, smacking his lips.

 

“Mm, that’s good stuff,” he said. “So, thanks for reading, and as ever, leave a review if you have any questions or requests.”


	23. Chapter 23

The now-familiar room was empty, though it wasn’t that way for long as Edpool sauntered in, steamy and clean after a very thorough shower.

 

“Twelve showerheads,” he sighed as he plunked into his seat. “Like…eight is even a bit excessive, but twelve is the stuff of fiction. I think maybe this is just a product of the writer’s ignorance on the subject of rich people showers.”

 

Even so, he didn’t appear to be complaining as he settled into his usual seat, taking up a slice of pizza. He really had been en

 

The first thing May “Mayday” Parker thought when she saw the boy that would have grown up to be her father was that he was already sort of good-looking. He would definitely grow into his looks as he got older, but he had a boyish handsomeness that made it easy to believe he had charmed six or seven girls into sharing him. In her younger years, even May herself had had an innocent daughter-crush on him until Mom had told her that such thoughts were not necessarily appropriate.

 

In any case, Peter Parker was…well, cute.

 

He was also just…very sad. Mayday wasn’t the best psychic, not by a longshot, but she was a good one, and she was especially attuned to spider-totems, those with spider powers and thus connections to the Great Web. And since Peter Parker was (in a now-alternate future) her father, she had an especially attuned connection to him.

 

Still, when she walked in, he fixed her with a curious look, taking in the icy-blue of her eyes, the way her jaw was almost a perfect copy of Riley’s, the nose that looked a lot like the pictures he’d seen of his mother. She could see the recognition in his face as much as read it on his mind.

 

“Peter,” Gwen said from her seat next to his bed in the Osborn penthouse, “this is, um…a little hard to explain, but this is your daughter.”

 

Oh, his mind had a tough time with that one. Sure, it followed the path of what it meant to have a child, but it landed on the fact that he’d never even done “the do” in his own mental words and just ground to a halt.

 

“Um…what?”

 

“Okay, so…this is a bit of a doozy, but I promise it’s all true,” Gwen said. “Or…at the very least, we all have a great reason to believe it’s true.”

 

She proceeded to detail Mayday’s story, or what May had been allowed to divulge. Sure, there was technically no one left to punish her for revealing too much, but she understood that letting someone know too much about the person they had the potential to become went way too far into the realm of a self-fulfilling prophecy. The fact that she was even still around and hadn’t obliterated her own existence was only a testament to the strange power over time that the Time Stone held.

 

“I have a daughter with…Emma Frost?” Peter asked when Gwen and Mayday finished their explanation. “I mean…I don’t even _know_ Emma Frost.”

 

“Well, you sure _get_ to know her,” Mayday said in a low mutter. “I think she went for whatever you became after a lot of alone time with Venom.”

 

“Reassuring,” Peter said, and Mayday shrugged, making her way over. She wasn’t sure how to feel right now. She’d done it; she’d accomplished what she’d come back to this time period to do. And now she was stuck. It was just as well; technically, she had eliminated the timeline leading to where she’d come from. If she tried to travel to her present again, it would be a changed world, one where she very likely didn’t exist.

 

Now she didn’t really belong anywhere.

 

“Is she anything like Emma Frost?” Peter asked, looking between Gwen and Mayday. Gwen smirked, shaking her head.

 

“No, no, she’s…she’s actually a little too much like you, it’s adorable,” Gwen said, and Mayday rolled her eyes.

 

“I’m not adorable, I’m a super tough psychic,” she pouted. Gwen gave her the same smile she’d given her in an alternate future, when Mayday had shown that “trademark Parker dorkiness” that seemed to resonate so deeply with so many people. According to Gwen and Harry of the future, it had meant that Peter had still been in there somewhere, behind Venom and the newer guise of Poison.

 

That, more than anything, had spurred them toward the decision that had led Mayday to be in this very place and time. Time travel was a delicate tool and to be used only in the most dire of situations, but the Neighborhood Watch had decided that they would be sparing plenty of people years of heartbreak by sending Mayday back to stop Poison from gaining power.

 

“Well…I guess I should thank you,” Peter said. “If it wasn’t for you, I guess I’d be going full supervillain. So…thank you for helping us out.”

 

His smile was so warm and welcoming, so very sweet in a way her dad’s never was in her own timeline, that no matter how much of a stranger she was in a strange timeline, she couldn’t regret her current state of affairs.

 

Peter Parker’s smile was just too genuine to regret.

 

……

_“Hello, fellow Neighborhood Watchers! Welcome to another episode, coming to you live from my granparents’ basement in Indiana! My dorm may have been wiped out by some kind of mutated stegosaurus guy, but at least my family survived thanks to, you guessed it, the Neighborhood Watch! And I am in love. Watchers, I have met my future husband, and his name is Ricochet.”_

 

“Oh, gag,” Kamala said, rolling her eyes as Danika Hart continued her antics on the screen of the laptop perched on Ganke’s thighs. The girl’s YouTube channel, dedicated to all things superhero-based in New York City, had seen a sharp spike in traffic following the Terrigen bombing. Danika herself was a cute thing, with long brown hair tipped with purple and thick hipster glasses that magnified her already large doe-eyes. She was the kind of cute energetic girl boys her age would watch less for news and more to idolize.

 

She was also, unfortunately, the best source for news regarding anything and everything pertaining to their little hobby.

 

“Yo, Miles, this girl is actually kinda hot,” Ganke said, looking over and visibly quailing at Kamala’s look. “I mean…seen hotter, but you know….”

 

“Nah, she’s not really my type,” Miles said, and Kamala was relieved at how strong his voice sounded. For the first few days after his arrival at the SHIELD-controlled hospital he currently resided at, he had been stable but weak, his advanced healing factor working overtime to compensate for the anticoagulant that seemed to come right out of the Green Goblin’s claws. Now, though, he was doing much better, and they were already considering releasing him that day or the next.

 

“I mean, she does seem a bit stalkerish,” Ganke said, peering at the screen of his laptop. “I bet I could make her year if I just showed up in costume and like gave her an interview or something.”

 

“I’m not sure if that’s supposed to be altruistic or some kind of pickup scheme,” Kamala told him, and Ganke shrugged.

 

“Can’t it be both?” he asked. Kamala was about to retort when Miles shook on the bed with laughter.

 

“You’re insane,” he told his friend, who smirked right back. Miles turned to look back up at the TV, leaving Kamala to peer over at him. Seeing him in such a terrible state after fighting the Green Goblin had had a profound effect on her. She had only known this boy, this sweet kindhearted boy for a few days, but now, she felt this weird, irrational need to…to just take _care_ of him. Miles was the kind of selfless boy that would get himself killed trying to save a kitten in a tree, and Kamala just wanted to be there to help him.

 

“Kamala,” Ganke said, jerking her from her thoughts. She turned to see him nodding at his laptop screen. “Pizza? The hospital says we can order in.”

 

“Um, polite pass,” she says.

 

“There’s, um…a kosher deli nearby that delivers hoagies,” Miles said, smiling over at her. “We could hook you up with a kosher pizza sub. You said kosher overlaps with halal, right?”

 

“I’m down for subs,” Ganke said. “Like…four of them. Myself.”

 

“Right, super-metabolism,” Kamala observed wryly. “So, four jumbo footlongs for the bottomless pits, and a halal pizza sub for the weird Muslim girl.”

 

“Okay, I’ll accept that you’re weird,” Ganke said, “but not for being a Muslim. Like, you’re weird because you can make yourself huge at the drop of a hat or shrink down to the size of a DnD figurine.”

 

“Cool weird,” Miles added.

 

“Guys, c’mon,” Kamala said with a laugh. “I didn’t mean it that way. But…thanks.”

 

“Hey…is that Tony Stark?” Ganke said, pointing at the TV hanging in the corner of Miles’s room, which was on but muted. Miles reached for the remote and turned the sound on.

 

“ _…from the wreckage of Williams Industries, where Tony Stark is apparently making an announcement. Oliver?”_

_“Diane, the excitement is palpable today, as a select few news outlets have been allowed into New York City to bring you this live report from the remains of Williams Industries, where Tony Stark, head of Research and Development at Oscorp, is preparing to make what he calls a ‘momentous announcement’. As most of our watchers may know, less than a year ago, Tony Stark was ousted from the company his father helped build, Stark Industries, which was recently rebranded by CEO Obadiah Stane into Stane Industries. Since then, Tony Stark has taken up a position as head of Research and Development at Oscorp, and as we’re no doubt about to find out today, he has been hard at work since then.”_

 

“What’s he up to?” Kamala asked. She had only met Tony once, when he had paid a brief visit to Miles to check up on him on Peter’s behalf, but she had quickly learned that Tony was always on the move, and when he stopped, it seemed like it was just a brief break on the way to his next scheme.

 

“ _Oliver, is there any meaning to the choice of location for today’s announcement_?” the anchor on screen said.

 

“ _Well, it’s no secret that Williams Industries was already in financial trouble_ ,” Oliver said. “ _CEO Simon Williams was only months away from filing for bankruptcy, and this disaster left him with little other choice but to sell to the highest bidder. Today, I believe we’re about to find out just what Tony Stark has in store for the real estate.”_

 

The screen cut over to Tony standing behind a podium on a small stage that had been hastily build in the front yard of the Williams Industries building. He was wearing sunglasses, which was probably for the best, as there was a constant deluge of camera flashes assaulting him, despite the small turnout. As always, when he wasn’t wearing a metal suit, he was wearing a finely-tailored one of the more traditional variety. He looked handsome as ever, unflappable and always in control.

 

“ _Good afternoon_ ,” he said in a level voice. “ _I’d ask how the roads were, but that just seems like it would be in poor taste._ ”

 

He paused, politely allowing the assembled journalists to chuckle.

 

“ _I’ve invited you all here because I had a really neat idea, and I wanna show it off_ ,” he said. “ _So, as you all probably know, because it was all over every news outlet including the ones I’m seeing here, several months ago, I was rather abruptly out of a job, and I found my way to Oscorp after no small amount of shenanigans that will most certainly be exaggerated in whatever biopic they make about my life. Also, if that happens, I’m calling it. Robert Downey Jr., you have my personal endorsement.”_

The assembly let another rumble of laughter before he continued.

 

“ _I digress. In the interest of proving how useful I really am to Norman Osborn, because that guy is just…hard to impress sometimes, I’m announcing the groundbreaking of Stark Technologies, a subsidiary of Oscorp. Basically, it’s Stark Industries, but I leave all the business stuff to people that can actually handle that sort of thing. I mean…let’s face it, I’m not a businessman, I’m an inventor, and – “_

 

“ _Pardon the interruption, Mr. Stark –_ “

 

“ _Very…much pardoned, Miss…_?”

 

The camera panned over to what was unsurprisingly a young blonde reporter, the crowd pulling away to allow focus on her. Only such a bombshell could interrupt Tony Stark and get away with it.

 

“ _Christine Everhardt, Vanity Fair_ ,” the woman said. “ _I’m sorry if my question doesn’t quite relate to the topic at hand, but do you have any comment on the rumors of your association with SHIELD and the Avengers_?”

 

“ _Are the Avengers actually a thing now_?” Tony asked. “ _People…know about that and stuff_?”

 

“ _We do_ ,” Christine Everhardt said with a simpering smile. “ _And given some of the footage that’s been seen online, do you have anything to say about the particular equipment being used by the so-called Iron Family?_ ”

 

“ _That’s an interesting name_ ,” Tony said. “ _Definitely implies some sort of…fraternal bond. Kinda like that. It’s a little heavy-handed, I suppose, but –_ “

 

“ _There are a number of reliable sources that seem to believe you’re the one supplying the Iron Family with their tech and equipment_ ,” Christine went on, unfettered by Tony’s thinly-veiled attempts at subterfuge.

 

“ _Why would they think something so…fantastic_?” Tony asked, a smirk forming on his face as he spoke. “ _Look, SHIELD and the Avengers are definitely a heroic bunch, but to imply that I’m a member is –_ “

 

“ _No one was implying that_ ,” Christine said with a quirk of the eyebrow, the camera panning back over to her briefly before focusing back on Tony. To his credit, the inventor’s expression betrayed very little other than the slight look of someone who knows he might have said a bit too much.

 

“ _Alright, can we focus up_?” Tony asked, sounding the slightest bit exasperated. “ _So…the important thing to note is…._ ”

 

“He’s gonna do it,” Ganke breathed, a grin stretching across his face. “Holy shit, he’s gonna do it.”

 

“He wouldn’t,” Miles said, and Kamala saw a disbelieving smile on his face as well.

 

“Is he gonna tell people – “

 

“ _I am Iron Man_.”

 

The camera shook a bit as the various reporters gathered at the conference converged on Tony, who wore the smuggest expression of satisfaction at the attention this little announcement had garnered.

 

“Oh, he’s gonna regret that,” Kamala said.

 

……

 

“Well…so much for making it as homeless New York street urchins,” Kiden grumbled as she trotted along the streets, following behind the long coat of her traveling companion. Not really paying attention to their path, instead focused on the wreckage around them, she ended up bumping into her new friend, who had tensed up, arms held out to her sides. Just as she heard the soft sound of her companion scenting the air, an image bloomed over her vision, tinged the blue that told her she was getting another flash of the future. In the vision, her companion’s attention was focused on a sound to her left, and she was attacked from the right by some kind of –

 

“Laura, on your right!”

 

To her credit, Laura reacted immediately, leaping away from some muscly guy with huge bony protrusions sticking out of his wrists.

 

_Snikt!_

 

“What the fu-ah!” His words were cut off as one of the twin blades coming from between the knuckles on Laura’s right hand stabbed right through his shoulder. Laura spun, raising a leg in a high kick that caught the attacker coming from her left, probably cracking his collarbone as she stabbed him in the arm with a claw that came out of her foot.

 

She had ruined a lot of shoes on their journey.

 

The two men slumped to the ground, not dead but definitely painfully injured, and Laura turned to make her way back over to Kiden’s side. Her longcoat trailed open behind her, allowing her pale, milky legs to gleam in the moonlight. Laura’s wardrobe was…well, she definitely favored a certain style, and that was Gothic Lolita. The look only became slightly creepier now that she was a bit spattered with blood, her shirt ripped to show off the milky skin of her midriff. The girl was definitely hurting for some sunlight. But then, so was Kiden. In fact, Laura’s dark hair meant that her porcelain skin was just a nice contrast. Kiden was pale and blonde, washed of any color. She dyed her hair bright blue just to add some kind of brightness.

 

“You alright?” Laura asked her, and Kiden nodded. She always asked that, after every fight, in a distant-sounding voice that sounded almost distracted. Kiden briefly wondered where her mind went during these little scuffles, but as soon as the thought occurred to her, she figured she was better off not knowing.

 

“I’m fine, Laura,” Kiden said. Laura smiled at that, a pretty smile that really did wonders for her in comparison to the morose expression she usually wore. She seemed to love it when Kiden said her name, especially right after a scuffle. She wasn’t much of a hugger, but that look made it feel like she was wrapping Kiden right up in her arms.

 

“Aw, looka that, Gray, that’s just…sweet, isn’t it?” a gravelly voice said, and the pair turned to see two…men making their way over. At least, they looked mannish in shape. The taller of the two was green with mottled, scaly skin, pointed ears, and a mane of thick black hair. His eyes glowed faintly yellow and were wide with manic glee as he surveyed the carnage Laura had left behind. The other was as gray as his name implied, with smooth skin like a gecko’s and a tuft of white hair that sat atop his head between a pair of curled horns, like a ram’s. He grinned at Kiden, showing off black teeth and gums.

 

“Hey there,” he said in a reedy voice. “You two lost?”

 

“Gray, don’t be a stereotype, c’mon,” the green one said, turning to Kiden and Laura. “Sorry about my friend, he’s seen a few too many spooky movies, and he’s just silly sometimes. I’m Green Goblin, and this is Gray Goblin. You two…you look like a couple’a kids that ran away from somewhere and were looking to settle up in New York, carve out a living as homeless vagabonds, eh? Things went a bit sideways, though, as you can see.”

 

“What happened?” Kiden asked, lurking behind Laura’s outstretched arm. She felt the gentle push, as she always did when Kiden did the talking. Kiden knew that _Laura_ knew that she was the mouthpiece of their little duo but didn’t want her wandering too far, where Laura couldn’t keep her safe.

 

“Oh, there was just a whole thing with some kinda superpower gas-bomb that gave all sorts of people all sorts of weird powers,” the Green Goblin said. “That’s how my pal here and I ended up all colorful and goblin-y. We used to be perfectly normal humans, believe it or not.”

 

“And that ended in New York getting quarantined?” Kiden asked, earning a shrug from the goblin.

 

“We live in a weird world,” he said. “People see people with powers flying and swinging and shooting fireballs and…c’mon, if you had to live each day seeing that stuff, wouldn’t you go a little nuts when you finally had those powers yourself?”

 

“Not especially,” Laura said, and Kiden shrugged at the sentiment. The Green Goblin just chuckled.

 

“Well, you’re better people than us, I guess,” he said. “Still, you’re looking for a place to stay, right? We got a little clubhouse going on, and you’re welcome to crash with us. You’d have to help out of course, I mean…we won’t ask you to go topside and fuck up the normies if you don’t wanna, but I mean…are either of you good with laundry?”

 

“I could be,” Kiden said. “Long as you’re not sexist about it.”

 

“Ah, the last thing we wanna be is sexist,” the Green Goblin said. “You wanna get Gray to help you out, he folds clothes like nobody’s business.”

 

“Retail,” the Gray Goblin said with a sheepish little smile. “You gotta get good at it.”

 

“Fast food,” Kiden said with a small nod. “I’ll never put ketchup on my burgers the same ever again.”

 

“Hey, looka that,” the Green Goblin said. “Had yourselves a little bonding moment there.”

 

“So…what’s your deal?” Kiden asked, feeling Laura’s grip tighten on her wrist. Laura could always tell, could always sense when Kiden’s future-sight was taking hold. As the blue tinge bloomed over her vision, she felt the strong arms of her companion grip her tightly.

 

Quite suddenly, the very same Green Goblin they had just seen was standing over a body, turning to Kiden and giving her a sad sort of smile. For some reason, the borderline manic grin made her feel absolutely safe.

 

_“Sorry you had to see that. You alright?”_

 

And then, she was looking up from a prone position, Laura on one side, the Green Goblin on the other, alongside the Gray Goblin and two others.

 

_“She’s gonna die if we don’t do something.”_

_“No. She’s not. Gray, do everything you can. We’re saving her.”_

And then, she was on a building, what felt like the tallest building ever. She was looking over a city, the city sprawled out before her, and Laura was standing next to her. She looked at Laura, and Laura smiled back. She smiled, and it was the most genuine expression of…of love. She leaned in and –

 

And there she was, her nose so close to Kiden’s. Kiden blinked and had to physically stop herself from closing those last few inches, leaving a surprised Laura to look from her to the goblins. Things were normal again, the vision having left her behind.

 

“What did you see?” she asked softly. Kiden shook her head, turning her gaze from Laura to the goblins, who seemed perfectly inclined to wait politely for their moment to finish.

 

“I…think it might be a good idea for us to go with them,” Kiden said, looking back up at Laura. “They can help us.”

 

“We really can,” the Green Goblin said with a grin that would be menacing under literally any other circumstance. “We got a…whole thing setup, it’s real nice. Gray here got a generator going, so we got power, a whole, uh…kitchen deal going on. It’s gonna be awesome. And we’re kinda doing this shelter, like a…Gray, you had a good word – “

 

“Commune,” Gray Goblin said. “It’s a commune. Or, you know, it will be, once we get more people involved.”

 

“How’s that sound?” the Green Goblin asked. “Commune? Friendly people, working together, outcasts from society? Heck, we…got a couple girls back home, too. So, it won’t be like a sausage fest and then just you two.”

 

“If it means a warm shower and a decent meal, I’m down,” Kiden said, glancing up at Laura. “Yeah?”

 

“I go where you go,” Laura said in a flat voice. “And…a shower would be pretty great.”

 

It was one of the few times Kiden had ever heard her attempt humor, and she found herself giggling more at the fact that she had attempted it than the joke itself. Laura was mysterious in every sense of the word, and she hadn’t shown much of a personality since Kiden had met her; this was a welcome change.

 

“I suppose we’ll join up with you,” Kiden said. “First thing that’s felt like home in weeks.”

 

……

 

“Aw, that’s just precious,” Edpool said, leaning back in his seat, his fingers gliding along Dachspool’s back. “So, the last round of interludes is a bit…well, hectic. Things got a bit crazy for our dear author, with his first Christmas as one half of a couple and…well, Christmas in general. After the New Year, though, who knows, maybe he’ll make a resolution to keep up on his story. Maybe. Not likely, though, huh?”

 

He chuckled, reaching out to pick up a bottle of wine, pouring some into a glass and taking a sip.

 

“So, that’s it,” he said. “If your request wasn’t met in this chapter, rest assured, it will be in the actual story. The author…well…he’s a massive ball of neglected ego. He needs constant reassurance, so when you stroke that ego, get it nice and throbbing and…turgid…oh, he’ll do anything to keep that going. Shameless, really.”

 

He scritched the dapper doggo behind the ears with one last nod to the readers.

 

“And with that, the interlude is finished,” he said. “The next chapter will pick up with our heroes in the midst of a well-deserved break. Summer antics and coming-of-age bullshit will surely ensue. So…stay tuned!”

 

With that, he took a final sip of his wine, tipping the glass toward the readers in a final farewell.


End file.
